Coming to a Realization Based on a Few Words
by blackflamesofrage
Summary: After a teammate labels him as the liability on team 7, Naruto goes off on his own and trains for a while. He also realizes the that the road to being Hokage is a long winding path. Pairings in the future but not before the 1st timeskip. Lemons later on
1. Etched in Stone

Description: After a teammate labels him as the liability on team 7, Naruto goes off on his own and trains for a while before the chunin exams start. Will he become better and accomplish his life long goal of Hokage? Pairings in the future, but not in first part before time skip.

A/N: This is my first fic so please take it easy on me, I appreciate constructive criticism and it always helps me attain a higher level of writing.

**Kyubi: Hi**

Naruto Characters: Hi

_Thoughts: 'I am thinking of something'_

* * *

After the carnage displayed the unfinished bridge, which included Haku and Zabuza's dead bodies lying next to each other. Kakashi and team 7 decided to head back to Inari and Tsunami's house. All was quiet with the members of team 7, and all of them reflecting on the day's events. Sasuke thinking about how to get stronger than others so he would not get knocked out by enemy nin. Haku had laid quite a beating on Sasuke, even with Sasuke using his sharigan, which was another thought he was pondering. In another room, Sakura was replaying the events of the day and how useless she was. Replaying the events she discovered that she wasn't the only useless one during the fight. Outside of the house though was Naruto who was meditating. Naruto had never taken meditation so seriously before. Naruto was trying to contact the Kyubi and talk to it. All the sudden a noise was heard as a person was exiting the house. Naruto peeked his eyes open to see who it was and he saw pink hair approaching him. He thought he could go back into a meditative mode and that Sakura was going to go by him on a walk into town or towards the bridge but after 30 seconds more, he noticed that she was standing over him and glaring down at him.

"Hello Sakura, you seem mad for some reason". Naruto stated, he was wondering why Sakura seemed so mad.

Sakura didn't say a word for a while; a long awkward silence was present before Sakura finally made up her mind as she found the words that she wanted to say.

"Naruto...." Sakura said in a condescending tone, "Why didn't you help Sasuke during your fight against Haku?" Sakura seemed to be getting angrier by the second just thinking over the sequence of the fight today.

"Sakura, why are you saying that I didn't help during the fight?" Naruto tried to get a read off her face but she had a blank expression on her face. "Surely you saw that when Haku's ice chamber broke that I had chakra flowing around me". Naruto was beginning to get angry thinking about Haku and how his death

occured.

"Naruto, you always have and always will be useless". Naruto had a look of surprise on his face as Sakura stated this. "You are Konoha's number one hyper-active knuckleheaded ninja and always be that way. Nobody will ever take you seriously because you never take anything seriously". Naruto began to shake and anger was rising within him. "You don't belong on this squad, Sasuke or I don't want you here. Kakashi-sensei is the only reason you are still on this team and

I refuse to work with you anymore. You have been an annoyance from day one and I don't want you on my squad anymore and neither does Sasuke". Sakura began to walk away and Naruto had his jaw nearly on the ground due to the way that Sakura just told him off.

"Sakura...wait, why are you doing this to me?" Naruto was beginning to get desperate. Sakura is somebody who he liked, not only as a crush but as a friend as well.

"Naruto, you just have got on my nerves, you did nothing against Haku today, and you attacked Haku after Sasuke had already worn him out. Haku was an easy target and you could trap him with the shadow clone jutsu. I just don't want you on my squad anymore; you are annoying and will always be that way in my book. I will NEVER and I repeat NEVER be your friend." Sakura took a few steps towards the house before she turned around towards Naruto.

"Naruto, you will always be the dead-last. You will never grow up and out of this childish shell that you are in. Your ninja skills will always be on a genin level and you will see as people like Sasuke, Kiba, Shino, myself and the other 4 grow out of our genin level and become chunin and then jonin. You will have to watch us rise to the top while you stay at the bottom with your pranks and childish games."

Sakura stormed off and closed the door to go back into the house. Naruto just sat, his thoughts became dormant all the sudden. Nothing was going through his head as he was just in shock after what he saw and heard. He sat in the same position for another minute before he began to regain his thoughts and senses. Naruto felt betrayed, this wasn't the first time in Naruto's life that he felt betrayed. He had been betrayed before by the village, for he was the vessel for the Nine Tailed Fox aka the Kyubi. The Kyubi had attacked Konohagakure 12 years ago and it took the life of the Forth Hokage to seal it away in a newborn baby. That newborn baby just happened to be Naruto.

**"Hey kid, are you going to sit there all day or are you finally going to talk to me"**

Naruto's eyes shot wide open in surprise as he recognized the voice. He had just heard the voice for the first time today but it was a voice that he would remember for the rest of his life and never forget it. Naruto slipped back into his meditative state and came face to face with the Kyubi.

"So Kyubi, you finally decided to come out of your cage and talk"

Naruto saw the Kyubi but it was the face only. A shadow could be seen behind him and Naruto quickly assumed that it was the body of the Kyubi. The Kyubi hadlarge red eyes with a shade of brighter red around the eyes. Naruto's eyes wandered down the face of the Kyubi to the teeth, the teeth were very large and hada canine shape to them. Two large fangs were very prominent though, both teeth were at the location where one's jaw would start curving to the side at a larger angle.

**"Yes Naruto, I have decided to come out and talk to you for a while. I know of your newfound aspirations to begin training seriously and I have now decided to come out and help you." **Naruto observed the Kyubi but Kyubi could tell Naruto had something was on his mind.** "So Gaki, what is on your mind?**"

Naruto looked up in surprise that the Kyubi would notice such a minute detail with Naruto.

"Kyubi, why did you choose to come out at that moment, I had been trying to call upon you for the last 20 minutes yet you did not appear and I wasn't able to come within to be able to talk to you."

Kyubi smirked; well if the thing could smirk, that action with its facial expression would be labeled as a smirk.

**"So Gaki, you do possess intelligence and observation skills..very well, I'll tell you exactly why I came out at that very moment"**. Naruto looked at the Kyubi expectantly and waited for the answer.

**"I feed off your anger Naruto, when you get angry is when you lose your emotions and become unstable. The seal on you becomes weaker and my chakra is able to leak out and I'm able to feed you power. Thus, you become more like me. You're fighting style and emotions become like mine". One day, if you survive that long, you should be able to absorb all my chakra and control it as your will. My main reason for appearing to you and telling you all of this is simple..as long as you or one of your offspring survive then I can still live. For now, your fate is mine as well. So me guiding you along and encouraging you to take this new training to heart and this will help me..."**

"..Survive" Naruto stated quickly, Kyubi was in shock that Naruto would cut him off. "I understand Kyubi, you want to survive longer and you are going to survive through me".

**"Naruto, I'm going to warn you of something though, that Uchiha boy is danger. His chakra tells of anger and revenge, although you have some sort of bonding with this team, you should consider going out on your own and start training on your own.". "Also, since you are turning a new leaf I'm going to lend you some of my abilities such as a keen sense of sensing chakra. Meaning you are going to be able to tell and track people easier. You are also going to get a stronger sense of smell, although this doesn't sound like a big advantage, it's going to help you in battle."**

"Thanks Kyubi, I'll be talking to you again sometime soon. I'm going to consider what you said about training on my own."

With that, Naruto opened his eyes again and snapped out of his meditative state. His feeling of anger returned after remembering what Sakura just said to him about the fight that he had against Haku today.

**"Remember kid, I can also communicate with you like this, this personally is easier for me but just make sure that you don't say things out loud. You want to stay as normal to the kids your age, they don't know about me like their parents do."**

Naruto took this comment and let it soak in before getting up and heading back into the house. Naruto opened the door slowly and made sure it didn't make too much noise. He waived to Tsunami quickly before heading off to find a certain somebody. He quickly checked the house and found the person that he was looking for. The person he was looking for was talking to Inari. Inari had a look of surprise on his face as he opened his mouth and started to speak.

"Really that happened, he really did do that?" asked Inari with a look of shock and trying to picture a mental image of the event occurring.

Naruto smiled when he saw Inari look so happy. Naruto thought about his past and compared it to Inari's past. He remembered Inari when he first met him. Inari basically was still grieving the death of a male-figure in his life. To Naruto, this was a foreign feeling. Naruto never had a father figure and still to this day doesn't know who his father is. Naruto though, could understand the pain and suffering of being picked on as the boy told the story of how he was rescued after being pushed off a small dock and not being able to swim. Having peers reject you and make fun of you like you are nothing and never be anything. Actually, Naruto had just experienced this feeling. Naruto became so engrossed in his thoughts that he didn't see his target turn toward Naruto and usher him to come sit down.

"Ah, Kakashi-sensei and Inari, it's nice to see the both of you together and having a good time." Naruto gave both of them a genuine smile before choosing to speak again. "Inari, I heard Tsunami wanted you to do something for her. She told me that it would only take about 5 minutes."

Inari began to grumble about having to go help his mother while Kakashi was telling exciting stories. Naruto could tell that Kakashi was entertaining him and had Inari completely enthralled with whatever story he was telling.

"Inari, when you come back. I'll also be here and Kakashi-sensei will continue to tell his exciting stories". Naruto gave Inari another geniune as Inari quickly left the room to take the least possible time so he could be back in time for Kakashi to continue his story.

"Kakashi-sensei, there is something that I need to talk to you about" Naruto looked directly into his one eye. Kakashi noted that Naruto looked serious and quickly asked Naruto what Naruto wanted to talk about.

"Naruto, what is it that you wanted to talk about?" "Is it something about what happened today?" Kakashi inquired.

"Actually Kakashi, it is something that happened today but it isn't what you think it is." Kakashi's one visible eybrow raised in the air as if wondering what Naruto could possibly be talking about.

"Today Sakura came up to me and told me that I was completely useless during today's mission" Naruto spat out.

"What!!??" Kakashi said in a surprised tone of voice. Kakashi looked down for a minute and then spoke. "Don't tell her this but she was actually the useless member of the team today, all she did was protect Tazuna and she almost failed at that job. When Zabuza launched himself towards her, she completely froze up like you did with those 2 chunin when we left for the village hidden in the mist."

Naruto laughed at that memory, even though it was a very recent memory. Naruto vowed to himself that he would never do that again in battle. Even in battles in which the opponent was stronger.

"Kakashi-sensei..." Kakashi looked up as Naruto said his name as almost if he were depressed. This was not the ninja that Kakashi knew. This ninja was depressed and had scars on the inside. Not the hyper-active ninja that didn't have a care in the world.

"She said that she and Sasuke did not want me on this squad anymore and that you were the only reason I was on this squad. She just completely put me down and labeled me as the person that will always be taken as a joke because I didn't take things seriously and always be the dead last out of all the ninja in Konoha".

"I don't understand why she would just lash out against you like that unless she really felt that you did nothing, which in reality we know you did and used strategy to beat Haku before Haku sacrificed himself against my lightning blade." Kakashi stated, while flicking his eye side to side trying to remember details about the fight.

"Anyway, I'm over it but I want to train alone for a while". Kakashi looked again in surprise as his one eye widened. "My gut instinct told me that I should train on my own for a while. I just have a feeling that if I am able to train alone for a while then I will be able to be a better shinobi than I am right now."

"I see" mumbled Kakashi. "No offense Naruto, but if Sakura is going to be like this then you should take some time off from our missions and just go out to a training ground and try to perfect your ninjutsu and taijutsu. You have shadow clones so that should help you quite a bit though. You haven't scratched the surface of what the clones are really meant to do though Naruto."

This time it was Naruto who looked up in surprise as Kakashi was about to tell him something about the shadow clones that he didn't know.

"The shadow clones are more for information gathering than an actual offense or defensive, although it is good for diversions, offensive attacks and defensive maneuvers. The shadow clones are for information gathering due to the person who used the clones taking all the information in that was gathered from the clones. Although Naruto, I say use this wisely because if you get too many clones you can have an information overload with your brain and you could lose all the information that you gathered and then lose some more due to the brain needing time to heal. I would recommend that you go to the library and read up on how to do jutsu's on different elements and how to improve your ninjutsu skills and taijutsu skills. Chakra control is important but the tree climbing exercise on larger trees should help with that slowly, or maybe even climbing mountains without using your hands will help. Just be careful on that though."

Kakashi was observing Naruto as he was talking about how to improve his skills and noticed that Naruto really was listening to what he was saying and taking it all in. 'I can really tell he has changed, I would like to have him in this team for a while longer but it's crucial that he gets this alone time away from distractions'. An image of Sakura came to mind and Kakashi frowned.

"I will talk to the Hokage about you taking some time off and the situation. I'm sure he will understand and will let you go train instead of being on a bunch of D-ranked missions with us. To tell you the truth, D-ranked and C-Ranked missions can be accomplished by me alone; this will improve Sasuke's and Sakura's teamwork with each other." Kakashi sighed and then said "Either that or it will be an amusing site for me to see Sakura attempt to flirt with Sasuke and get turned down. She really doesn't realize that he is not interested in her."

Naruto bowed to his sensei and then said "Thank you Kakashi-sensei, you have helped me with my problem. In a short period of time I'm really starting to trust you much more than I did during our first mission. Now if you could excuse me, I have used a lot of chakra and need to go to sleep early." Naruto turned to go back into his bed when Kakashi appeared beside him.

"Naruto if you ever need help or need somebody to talk to then just come and find me, I'm your sensei so I will try to answer all your questions to the best of my abilities."

Naruto turned and looked at Kakashi but then smiled.

"Thanks Kakashi-sensei." "You can be assured that I am going to be the best, Believe It!"

Kakashi chuckled as Naruto used his most commonly used expression. It showed that Naruto still had his old fun-loving side but it was apparent it was going to be hidden during this time of transformation into a more serious ninja.

"Now go off to bed Naruto before you fall asleep walking towards your room". Naruto laughed at this comment and then headed down the hallway towards his bedroom. Just as Naruto left, Inari came back in and began to talk to Kakashi again. He was asking about his eye and what was hidden behind that mask. Kakashi sighed and thought to himself

_'Guess that means I won't get to finish those last 4 chapters of Icha Icha tonight, I was really wondering how the main character was going to get the information out of the woman spy from the opposing village'._

* * *

(Time Skip to the next morning)

As team Kakashi walked across "The Great Naruto Bridge", Naruto turned around to see the creation and the sign exclaiming the name of the bridge. Sakura snorted

as Inner Sakura said _'If the bridge is anything like the ninja then I give it 4 years top before it collapses, wait make that 3 years'_. Sakura had a smile on her face after hearing Inner Sakura say that. She looked over at Sasuke who was staring at the ground as she wondered what he was thinking about. Sakura then noticed that it was quiet among the 4 ninjas. This was a rarity, especially since Naruto was on the team; the only sound was Kakashi's laughing when he read something funny out of 'Icha Icha'.

While walking away from the "Great Naruto Bridge", Naruto said that bridge will stand for a long time and provide a relief to the villagers. Naruto thought, that's much like my future. Once I get back and start training on my own then I'm going to be a great ninja and provide the village with the resources necessary for all the citizens to live a happy life. The bridge was just another motivator to Naruto. He had a lot to prove, especially to the whole village of Konoha and he was going to need a lot of training to get to level he wanted to be at. Of course, the shadow clones are going to speed this process up by three to four times, maybe even five. Naruto began to daydream about one day being Hokage, having a lovely wife and protecting the village he loved and the people he loved. Naruto was willing to do anything to make this dream a reality. He knew though, it all started with going back to Konoha and becoming the top genin, which was going to be a hard task by itself.

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A/N: So what did you guys think of it?? Please review so I can get some other ways of writing better and improving the story. It's a win-win situation for you guys because you get better writing and I improve my writing style.


	2. When 1 is better than 2

**A/N: The next installment of my story. I want to first off thank everybody who reviewed the story, added it to their favorites or put an alert on it. It really makes me feel good that people are actually willing to read my work.**

**Kyubi/Inner Sakura: Hi**

Naruto Characters: Hi

_Thoughts: 'I am thinking of something'_

_-------------------------------------------  
_

Chapter 2:

The trip from the Land of Waves back to Konoha was one that was maintained by awkward silence between all three of the team members. Both Naruto and Sasuke seemed to be very deep in thought the whole way back to Konoha. If Kakashi didn't know any better he would have thought that they were both completely on auto pilot. Kakashi knew though, that both Sasuke and Naruto were both concentrating on the abilities that they had learned while fighting Haku, but both were still in a mode that if the team gets attacked that they would quickly react. Sakura on the other hand was trying to get Sasuke to snap out of his "auto-pilot" mode. Little did Sakura know, Sasuke was aware that she was trying to get his attention but he didn't have time to worry about a pest like her. Sasuke was trying to figure out how to improve his sharingan, he knew it was a powerful weapon that ran in the Uchiha clan and he had even seen one in action (with Kakashi). Kakashi noted that Sasuke was pondering something and didn't need Sakura bothering him, finally Kakashi decided to do something about it.

"Sakura, why don't you get back up here at the front in case of an attack?"

Sakura quickly complied with his request and made her way back up towards the front, near Kakashi. Naruto and Sasuke brought up the rear, Kakashi knew that both of them could defend an attack from back there if need arise.

After another day of walking, team 7 arrived back at Konoha. Both Sasuke and Naruto were still in "auto-pilot" mode. The trip had been boring for Kakashi, once Sakura realized that Sasuke was going to be talking anytime soon, she tried to talk to Kakashi for a while. Kakashi really wanted to finish up those last chapters of 'Icha Icha' but only got through one chapter between looking for attacks and paying attention to Sakura (at least he was trying to be nice). In all honesty, Kakashi thought that Sakura was one of the most hopeless people on the planet. She was both boring and annoying and to boot, had an obsession with Sasuke. Kakashi could already see that Sasuke was never going to return the feelings that Sakura had for him. In a way for Kakashi it was irony because it was the same way that Sakura would never return the feelings that Naruto used to harbor for her. So in a sense for Kakashi, he saw it as poetic justice. Kakashi greeted the guards at the gates of Konoha as they let him in. Kakashi and team 7 walked in and the gates closed behind them. Kakashi turned around and looked at them.

"You guys can go back to your houses now. If I need any of you for any reason then I will come by and get you. As you know, I have to go report to the Hokage on this mission so stay where I can get you if I need to get you." For that last part Kakashi looked directly at Naruto, fully knowing that the Hokage would have to speak to Naruto regarding Kakashi advising Naruto to take time off from team 7 to train on his own.

Kakashi quickly disappeared leaving the three genins at the gate. Naruto was the first to act as he turned away and began to head back towards his apartment. Sasuke was the next to start to move but was quickly stopped by Sakura.

"Hey Sasuke"

Sasuke turned his head to look at Sakura who was beginning to try to get closer to him, obviously walking fast than he was.

"Do you want to go do something later today?"

Sasuke was chuckling in his head; this girl never gave up despite how much he showed he didn't like her. She was completely obsessed with him and would never give up on him no matter how much damage he did to her.

"No Sakura, I don't have time to do much today. I've got a lot of stuff to think about."

Sasuke turned his head back to face forward and walked off towards his estate, leaving Sakura standing there near the gates.

_'What will I have to do to get my Sasuke-kun' _Sakura thought to herself

**'Your pathetic kid, you need to take a more proactive approach, plus this is going to take a little time, he's not going to be going to another squad anytime soon'** remarked Inner Sakura.

After Inner Sakura had said that, Sakura began to go home.

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(At the Hokage's office)

"Report" said Sarutobi from his desk

"Hokage-sama, the mission to the land of the waves was a success"

"That is good Hatake, now report on how everybody in the squad did and how they are coming along with their skills"

"Hokage-sama, the mission regarding Tazuma the bridge builder should have been marked as an A-Ranked mission since we were attacked by Momoichi Zabuza and another ninja by the name Haku. I had to fight Momoichi twice during the trip. I defeated him both times, the first time Haku came and rescued him. Haku disguised himself as a hunter-nin and took his body away. I soon came to the conclusion afterwards that Haku hit Momoichi in an area that was not fatal; I apologize for not seeing that sooner. The second time was on the bridge where Haku was killed by me and Momoichi succumbed to injuries suffered both at the hands of me and a large amount of men who were summoned by Gato."

"So Gato was behind the force trying to stop the bridge building" replied Sarutobi, who seemed like he knew that was coming

"Yes, Gato was behind this but Momoichi killed him before he died."

"I see" said Sarutobi, still not showing a great deal of emotion. "Alright then, how did your team do during this mission?" Sarutobi had been wondering this question since there had been 2 ninja instead of 1 that confronted team 7 and Tazuna.

"The team did exceptionally well at the end of the mission, during the first fight they didn't do much but Naruto and Sasuke displayed good team work. The second fight they beat Haku with Haku using some sort of kekkei genkei to control water and trapping them in an ice chamber of sorts. Naruto leaked out some of the fox's chakra though, that is something we need to keep an eye on in the future and Sasuke has a sharingan now, it might be new to him but it's a great asset in battle as you know."

"Yes I'm aware of the sharingan and how it can help the user in battle. Naruto is another case though, as the fox leaks more chakra out he becomes stronger. We need him to learn how to control the chakra. If he is able to accomplish that then he might one day become Hokage." Kakashi smiled at this statement by the Hokage.

"Hokage-sama there is one problem though with Naruto." –Kakashi

"What is that? Did he do something wrong on the mission?" Sarutobi asked with a voice that was both demanding of an answer and eager to hear the answer.

"No, Naruto did very well on his first C-Ranked mission and looks to have a bright future but we have teamwork issues. Sakura Haruno, who is supposed to be the 2nd strongest in of the genin in our team, has lashed out at Naruto for not helping out in the battle against Haku." Sarutobi face-falled to this news. "She saw Sasuke who endured some injuries in the fight and then saw Naruto who had no injuries, due to the fox's healing powers and assumed Naruto did nothing but wait until the end to use shadow clones and trap Haku."

"Great, why did I know this would happen" said Sarutobi with a looking of understanding on his face

"I spoke with both Sakura and Naruto, Sakura doesn't understand that the Fox's abilities make him look like he doesn't have a scratch on him and she won't until she sees it in battle. So I advised Naruto to take some time off from the squad and go train on his own, Naruto has turned over a new leaf though, he seems like he is really going to handle the life of the ninja with a serious attitude." Hearing this news made Sarutobi smile.

"So how are you going to get him to train on his own while you handle the other two?" questioned Sarutobi, eager to hear Kakashi's answer again.

"I'm going to let him use my access to the Konoha library where he can read up on different jutsus and fighting techniques. Of course since most of our missions are D-ranked anyway, I will still be in town to help him. So I will train Sakura and Sasuke first and then go check on Naruto. This will provide me with a team that works together but also it's going to really strengthen Naruto."

"So by letting Naruto freelance on topics and learn whatever he wants is going to help him. Naruto does have a tendency to not pay attention to something when it is boring to him. That does explain his lack of genjutsu knowledge. Alright, I approve of this but I want to know what you are going to train him on." Kakashi's eyes moved during this resembling a smile, Sarutobi thought he was smiling but couldn't be sure since Kakashi wears that mask over half his face.

"I'm going to give him the element test early, Naruto should be positive for at least 2 elements, likely it will be wind and earth but it might be wind and water, I'm not completely sure of it. I know however though Naruto won't test positive for fire but he has the fox which is of fire, so through the fox he will be able to do fire jutsus. I also have reason to believe he has contacted the fox."

"What? He's already contacted the fox..that would explain why he has turned over a new leaf" Sarutobi was surprised and paused before he said that last part, making sure he was really sure of that. "Alright, you're dismissed but I'm going to want to see Naruto."

"I will go get him right now Hokage-sama." And with that, Kakashi disappeared in a puff of smoke.

_'This is going to be an interesting conversation to say the least, I'm starting to get too old for this job'_ thought Sarutobi as he leaned back in his chair while looking at all the paperwork on his desk.

_'It seems I can never escape this either'_. Sarutobi sighed as he looked at the pile and then decided to do some before Kakashi got back with Naruto.

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(Naruto's apartment)

Kakashi appeared in front of Naruto's apartment door. Kakashi stayed in his position for few moments and then decided to knock on the door. Kakashi then knocked on the door and waited for a few more moments again.

Naruto opened the door and saw his sensei. Naruto wore a smile on his face, in which you could tell Naruto was excited to see Kakashi-sensei.

"So Kakashi-sensei I can tell that the old man wants to see me".

"Yes Naruto, your assumptions are correct, I am now supposed to escort you to the Hokage tower and be there when this meeting between you two happens"

Naruto had a questioning look on his face. "Why do you have to be there Kakashi-sensei?"

Kakashi chuckled while thinking to him self; either that Naruto has already forgotten about their conversation a few days ago or how ignorant he was.

"Naruto, this is likely about you staying back to train on your own. Remember though that this has as much to do with you as me. I'm still the leader of team 7 and the jonin in charge of you."

Naruto just nodded as both student and teacher began walking towards the Hokage tower. Kakashi sometimes preferred to move towards the tower slowly, but this time he had no choice. Naruto couldn't transport himself from point A to point B quickly like he could, so Kakashi just took the time to absorb the scenery and sights of Konoha.

"Hey Kakashi-sensei". Kakashi looked down at Naruto as Naruto tried to get his attention.

"What is it Naruto?" Kakashi replied in curiosity

"Do you think that the old man will accept my request to train on my own?" Naruto asked, putting both hands behind the back of his neck, assuming as many call it "The Naruto Posture."

"I don't know Naruto. It could go either way." Kakashi said with uncertainty, especially on the first part.

Kakashi and Naruto continued walking towards the Hokage tower, both knowing that their fate could soon change. Naruto knew that if he was to remain with Sasuke and Sakura, especially Sakura he would have to learn to control his anger levels, plus Kakashi hadn't taught the team many other things since the Tree walking exercise.

_'If I stay with Sakura and Sasuke, I really have to learn how to control my anger and the fox's chakra. I may get so angry that all the sudden takes over and then the existence of both Sasuke Uchiha and Sakura Haruno may be wiped off the face of the earth. Just imagine how the village would react to that news. "Uzamaki kills last Uchiha and innocent girl"'_

"It wouldn't be a pretty sight Naruto, I know that I can easily dominate both of those teammates of yours, but I think you are underestimating the Uchiha boy and especially the sharingan."

Naruto was a little stunned that the fox would talk to him while he was lost in his thoughts

"Naruto….Naruto" Kakashi said trying to snap Naruto out of his inner thoughts

"huh?" replied Naruto, clearly unaware to his surroundings as he was lost in his thoughts and listening to what the fox had to say.

"Naruto we are here, seems that you were on auto-pilot again" Kakashi stressed the word again.

_'I don't like this Naruto as much as the old one, sure Naruto was a little loud for my taste but this one is completely withdrawn it seems. Naruto definitely has something bothering him but it isn't about Sakura and Sasuke, it is something other than that'._

The trip up to the Hokage tower once in the building was much similar to the last part of the trip where Naruto seemed to be on auto pilot and Kakashi was getting bored with the trek. Kakashi had nobody to talk to and he had finished the 'Icha Icha' book on the way back to Konoha. The new book was coming out in a few days and Kakashi was anticipating the release. Kakashi began thinking about the new book himself.

_'The new Icha Icha book is going to be released in the next few days. I'm going to have to take an off day just to get started on the book. Sasuke and Sakura will be able to handle themselves for a few days. What about Naruto though?? I can always check on him without having to put the book down so he will be fine as well.'_

Kakashi abruptly ceased his thoughts to make sure they were going the right way. Once he knew they were going to right way, he went right back into his thoughts

_'I'm pretty sure that the Hokage is going to let him train on his own so that Naruto can be a good ninja for the village. I'm sure that the Hokage is training Naruto to be the 5th hokage, I know that Konohamaru is also being raised to one day be Hokage. The Hokage himself says that Konohamaru is likely going to have a large amount of chakra, nowhere near close to Naruto's but a lot of that chakra comes from the kyubi anyway.'_

As Kakashi stopped his train of thinking, they arrived at the door of the Hokage's office. The Hokage sensed their presence from within the office.

"Come In" said Sarutobi

Kakashi walked back into the office, this time with Naruto at his side. Naruto had evidently snapped out of his train of thought as well because Naruto was alert and focused on the Hokage.

"Hi old man" Naruto said gleefully

Sarutobi sighed and put his hand on his face.

_'Well I guess some things don't change after all. I can definitely tell that there is something different about him but he still acts like the old Naruto. Maybe it's only to the people he truly cares about and the others who have neglected him see the cold shell that has enveloped him, like Kakashi was talking about earlier. Must be hormones, after all he is still a teenager.'_

"So Naruto, Kakashi told me that you have changed somewhat and you're going to start taking the life of a shinobi seriously now".

Naruto just nodded his head to Sarutobi's statement. Deep down, Naruto knew that this was going to be the beginning of a transformation. No longer would there be the troublemaking little kid, but a powerful shinobi who could not only use the shinobi arts but is the host of the powerful kyubi and can use its powers when necessary.

"Kakashi also recommended that you get some time alone to go train on your own. I agree with this plan of action. The main reason is that from what Kakashi has told me, Sasuke and Sakura need to be more cohesive as a unit, thus they need to improve their teamwork with each other." Naruto cringed at the mention of Sasuke's name and clenched his fists at the mention of Sakura's name. Kakashi noticed this and decided he needed to take action and say something fast before Naruto got too angry that the fox would take over.

"Listen Naruto..You and Sasuke have far superior teamwork than Sasuke does with Sakura. I've come to a conclusion that Sasuke doesn't even consider Sakura a part of the squad because she is weak and shows no resolve to help you out in a dangerous situation. This of course is hypothetical and based on observation of Sasuke's behavior towards you and Sakura but I'm pretty sure I am right."

Naruto unclenched his fists but Kakashi knew that he needed to explain some more on the team balance to Naruto.

"Because you and Sasuke consider each other to be rivals, you both have grown quickly and I'm proud of you. This also has done wonders to your teamwork as well. The whole behavior of trying to one up each other works really well when you two are fighting together. I saw this during the fight with Zabuza when Sasuke used you as a weapon and then you surprised Zabuza with an attack from behind. Either way, both sides are going to benefit from you taking time off to train by yourself. Although, knowing Sasuke, he won't benefit at all from this because he will continue to ignore Sakura, just like she ignores you Naruto."

Sarutobi was listening carefully to this and began to think about how the village council would react if he ever told anybody or they found out that the Hokage made a decision for team 7 that benefited the dead-last on the team rather than benefit the last member and pride of the Uchiha clan. It would become a political mess and the village council would be asking for shinobi's heads on a platter.

"So Naruto, my final ruling for this training of yours is going to be an approval. I'm going to approve the training as long as you have the necessary resources to train on your own. Kakashi is going to help you out with that as well, as well as checking in on you daily to make sure that you are making progress and are not eating ramen at Ichiraku's."

Naruto smiled after that but a sweat drop had formed on his face.

_'Kakashi-sensei can't catch me at Ichiraku's at all!! This isn't fair; I need my daily dose of ramen from there. I guess I'm going to have to learn to move quickly from place to place. I shouldn't have to do much reading on that subject, I can just imagine that if Kakashi-sensei catches me then I won't be able to have ramen for the rest of my life. That will really speed me up.'_

"Naruto..Kakashi you are both dismissed from here. Kakashi will escort you back to your apartment where he is going to rundown the things that you need to accomplish during the time of your training. If you don't accomplish this then a consequence will be rendered and you aren't going to like it."

Kakashi walked over to Naruto while Sarutobi was finishing his statement and stood right next to him while he finished. After he finished Kakashi said something to Naruto and then disappeared in a cloud of smoke.

_'I have to get back to my house in 3 minutes or he's calling off the training, that's near impossible it took me a while to get here anyway and that was walking. I guess I have to get going.'_

Naruto walked by Sarutobi desk and towards the windows.

"Bye old man, you need to clean up your desk with all that paperwork lying around there". As Naruto finished that sentence, Naruto jumped out the window and quickly began to rapidly move towards his apartment.

_'I was right; some things never change about that kid'_

-----------------------------------------------

(At Naruto's apartment)

Kakashi was waiting for Naruto at his apartment. He was being serious by telling Naruto that if he didn't get back within 3 minutes then he would be calling off the training. Kakashi though, fully expected Naruto to fully make it back in time though. Just as he thought about that, Naruto arrived at the front door, panting heavily and smiling as he knew he made it back in time.

"2 minutes and 45 seconds well done"

Naruto nodded and still had that smile on his face as he put his hands behind his head. Kakashi smiled himself when he saw Naruto do this. Maybe it was just an unconscious thing that Naruto did but it made him look more at ease.

"Do you know why I made you do that exercise Naruto?"

Naruto shook his head no, Naruto was apparently still out of breath and didn't really want to talk right now and was more focused on getting the oxygen back to his lungs and regaining a normal breathing pattern.

"I did that because, when in a situation of emergency, a person can push themselves far beyond what they expect to do. The emergency situation kind of works like an alarm, that allows the person to be notified of an emergency and helps the person unlock some sort of ability that can't be used when normally running, jumping or even fighting. I knew that you would beat the allotted time so I knew that I wouldn't have to cancel the training. This also served to show how much the training actually meant to you. If you hadn't made it by the time I set then I knew that the training wasn't much of meaning towards you. Now I see that it is in fact important to you and I'm going to begin to help you with it."

"I understand Kakashi-sensei" said Naruto, but still panting.

"Now Naruto we are going to go to the spot where you had your training match, I will accompany you there and I'm going to have you do something for me."

-----------------

(Timeskip to training ground 7)

Naruto and Kakashi arrived at training ground number seven. Kakashi walked towards the monument where the names of all the fallen Konoha ninja were written. Kakashi went over and glanced at the monument before turning around to face Naruto quickly.

"Now Naruto the reason I brought you here was so I can test your elemental affinities."

Naruto only nodded his head as Kakashi continued his explanation. Kakashi brought out the elemental paper which he placed in his hand.

"Naruto, what you are going to do is center the chakra into your hands; the paper will react to what type of element you are affinitive to. This will allow you to do the ninjutsu of the element easier. Now watch as I do this."

Kakashi took the paper into his hand and began to control chakra into the paper, the paper began to react to the chakra before it floated in the air for a few seconds and crumpled up.

"The paper crumpling up means that my elemental affinity is of raiton. I'm able to do lightning attacks easier than other attacks. I'm able to control the attacks and they are stronger because of the affinity. However though, it takes a long time to master an element. It takes most shinobi years to master an element. So now I want you to take the paper that I have in my hand and centralize some chakra into it. It's going to float into the air and then a reaction will take place, sometimes more than one reaction will take place, meaning that more than one elemental affinity is present but only a handful of ninja have more than one affinity."

Naruto took the paper into his hand and began to centralize chakra into his hand. Ever since the tree walking exercise, Naruto has begun to control chakra better and is able to centralize the chakra to most parts of his body. The paper began to float into the air in front of Naruto, the paper fell a little bit before it split in two and then became damp. Naruto was in awe of how the paper had two different reactions while Kakashi began thinking to himself.

_'I should have known that he would test positive for both Suiton (Water) and Futon (Wind). Minato-sensei has passed on his affinities to Naruto. This is going to make Naruto very strong. I'm sure that he is able to do Katon attacks through the fox. This means his only real weakness is Doton attacks. No wonder the Hokage is making sure Naruto gets good training. I bet he knew Naruto would test out for 2 affinities.'_

Kakashi quickly finished his thought and began walking over towards Naruto who was examining the paper lying on the ground. The two pieces of paper were damp and split in half perfectly. Naruto was touching it and looking at it in amazement.

"Naruto, you have tested positive for both Suiton and Futon affinities. This means that you are able to do the attacks with ease. You will be able to control the attacks easier than I can, just like I can control Raiton attacks easier than you. Now what you need to know is the elemental jutsu chart."

Naruto nodded and then began speaking

"Well Kakashi-sensei, where am I going to be able to see the chart?"

"I'm a jonin level shinobi who has a genin team, meaning I have access to the scrolls at the Konoha library. These scrolls contain jutsus and charts to help control attacks. I will get you the chart to study and memorize, so you can know your strengths and weaknesses."

Kakashi was about to say something else but thought better about it.

_'I have been restricted to not tell him about the kyubi. I wish I could tell him about it and how if he lets the kyubi control him that he will be able to control Katon attacks easier. I can't tell him that though, it's an S-Class secret and I will suffer a lot of consequences for being the one who tells it to him. I'm sure he has made contact with the kyubi, likely with the Haku battle especially with the burst of chakra that burned the ice dome kekkei-genkei that Haku had. I don't think he is that far with talking to the kybui to know that he will be able to control Katon attacks easier as well.'_

"Naruto, I have to go now and I'm going to the library now to get your supplies for your training. I won't be around during the day because I have to be with Sasuke and Sakura but as soon as they are done I will come here and check on you. Naruto I want you to train at this training ground every day until I approve you to train elsewhere." Naruto stared at Kakashi as he gave out the orders to not train anywhere else. Naruto was hoping he would be able to visit the different training grounds while he was training. Naruto had heard that each training ground was suited to train different aspects of a shinobi.

_'Why do I feel more comfortable with him near the monument of the fallen Konoha leaf, maybe he will read about it one day and come to appreciate the fallen shinobi as I do? It might also bring a sense of wariness when dealing with the kyubi when he sees all the names etched in after the attack on konoha by the kybui.'_

Kakashi quickly disappeared and Naruto was left staring at the training ground. He noted the wide open spaces and then the tight and narrow spaces where shinobi could barely fit through. He also observed the hiding positions and remembered the bell test that Kakashi gave team 7. Naruto snorted loudly when he remembered how reckless he was during that exam.

_'What was I thinking? Go ahead and scratch that, I wasn't thinking at all. Standing out there and letting Kakashi fight me and trying to be an equal to him, not a good idea. Not to mention that but I was hit with the 1,000 years of death jutsu and I have learned something from that. I never want to be hit with that again. That was painful and didn't feel very good. Oh well, enough thinking about that it's time to go back to my apartment and catch a good 7-10 hour nap before the real training starts. Maybe I can stop by Ichiraku's on my way back to the apartment. Old man said nothing about being there today.'_

Naruto began to slowly walk back into the town of Konoha. He noticed that all the people were pretty much staying away from him. Apparently they noticed his more cold and brooding attitude towards those who he does not like. To those he likes, he's the same old Naruto, but just a little more driven. Naruto was walking along the way to Ichiraku's when he noticed a box that was supposed to be camouflaged as rocks. The proportions were way off and it was easy to tell that somebody was hiding in it. Naruto played along with this and began to go on his way; the box of rocks however was following him and making a noise behind him. Naruto paused, turned around and looked at the box of rocks.

"That is about the worst disguise I have ever seen"

The box of rocks sat there for a minute

"Your good boss, you're sharp as ever."

All the sudden the box of rocks had a gunpowder explosion and out popped out a little boy with a long green scarf around his neck. He had black hair and resembled the 3rd Hokage in a way.

"Konohamaru how many times have I told you, nobody will ever fall for the box of rocks trick."

Konohamaru looked down and kicked a real rock (more like a pebble), the rock skidded along the dirt street for 10 feet and then began to do end over end flips until it finally came to a halt and went back to being stagnant.

"Boss, I know it's lame but it's always funny to see your reaction"

Naruto smirked but didn't say anything

"So boss, where are you going?"

Naruto looked down, a bit surprised that Konohamaru was so interested in him, he wondered why sometimes.

"I'm off to Ichiraku's, then I'm going home to sleep before I start back up training tomorrow."

The two walked towards Ichiraku's and finally arrived there after some small talk. Both ordered the same dish of ramen. Konohamaru asked why Ayame was so excited to see Naruto, trying to pry around with Naruto a bit to see if he already had a girlfriend but Naruto immediately stated that he was the #1 customer of Ichiraku's and Ayame was just happy to see him. After 5 minutes, both Naruto and Konohamaru got their ramen and began eating. It was truly a site to see, both pigging out to ramen and asking for more again and again. After a while, both left with going separate ways.

_'Although he's a brat and reminds me of myself, I still like Konohamaru. Those stupid sneak attacks are funny too, he thinks that everytime he is going to get me but he never will be able to until he masters his technique.'_

All the sudden, Naruto was pulled from his inner thoughts from somebody calling his name.

"Hey Naruto, anybody in there, I wouldn't be surprised if there wasn't. There is a reason you were dead last at the academy."

All the sudden a girl's laughing was heard. Naruto looked up and it was Ino Yamanaka. When Ino was around, that meant somebody had said something about him and she was going to try to get the truth behind a rumor.

"So Naruto, how was the mission, I heard that Sasuke did all the work and you did absolutely nothing and were useless."

_'Great looks like somebody's assumptions spread like wildfire. Wait a minute didn't Sakura and Ino hate each other. I assume then that they came to some kind of understanding'_

Naruto was pondering that thought when all the sudden a force was trying to penetrate into his mind. Naruto saw that Ino was in her jutsu pose and using her Mind Body Switch Technique. All the sudden though the force was bounced off Naruto and went back to Ino.

"What!!?? How could this be, I was penetrating into his mind" Ino whined

_'Just what the hell was that red barrier that my mind body switch force hit off of, it was very evil looking.'_

Naruto began walking by Ino, hoping he would be able to pass without a word but he decided to ditch that thought and as he walked by he whispered something in an inaudible voice to everybody but Ino.

"Please, don't try to mess around with me. Be warned though, that jutsu will never work on me."

Naruto quickly moved towards his house at the same pace he moved towards it earlier for Kakashi's first test. Naruto could feel the improvement in his physical energy as he was faster than the last time.

_'All I wanted was some stupid information, no need for him to get mad at me or anything. I've done that before on him and he didn't care. Wait a minute, back up..Naruto got mad..Naruto hasn't ever gotten mad before in front of me. The way he talked was scary though, it seems like he's changed a bit. Maybe that's what Sakura was talking about; he's probably just pissed off anyway. He can't hurt a fly though, he was dead-last at the academy and probably has just slacked off and pulled pranks since then. I could beat him in just a few minutes.'_

And with that, the Yamanaka walked off going back to her confident self as she was strolling the village looking for a way to kill time before she had to work another shift at the flower shop.

--------------------------

(Timeskip next morning)

Naruto had already woken up and had his breakfast, which included many outdated products but some newly bought milk. Naruto arrived at the training grounds where he and Kakashi met yesterday. Naruto showed up at the time when he was supposed to meet him but surprisingly Kakashi was already there waiting for him.

"Whoa! Kakashi-sensei I didn't know it was like you to be early. I guess there is a first time for everything."

Kakashi smiled and handed Naruto a few things.

"I got these scrolls which contain Suiton and Futon release attacks. I don't expect you to have them down by the end of the day but I expect you to have at least 4 down by the time we spar in 10 days."

Naruto's jaw dropped

"Wait, Kakashi-sensei, you said we are going to spar in 10 days"

"Yes Naruto, I'm going to spar against you in 10 days to see how much progress you have made. That was explained to me by the Hokage yesterday when I reported on what we did in the afternoon. I must say that the Hokage is impressed with you having 2 different elemental affinities."

"The Old Man was impressed with me?"

"Yes Naruto, he was very proud of the way that you have progressed in so little time. Well I have to be going, I'm late to the team 7 practice again, and we have to go catch the cat again. Nothing like these fun D-Ranked missions"

Kakashi quickly dropped off 12 scrolls with Naruto, waved "bye" quickly and disappeared in a cloud of smoke.

--------------

(With Kakashi at the bridge)

Kakashi landed on top of the bridge as Sakura and Sasuke was standing below waiting for him to arrive. Kakashi put his hand up in a welcoming motion as he spoke from above.

"Well Hi guys, sorry I'm late"

"Why are you always late!! What's your excuse this time!!" yelled Sakura

"A young boy needed my help and I thought it would be noble of me to help him out"

"So this man is more important than team 7!!" yelled Sakura again

"Why actually, he is very important" Kakashi said with a smile that could be seen through the covering of his mask.

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**A/N: So how did you guys like this longer chapter, it took me a while and I had a head start on it after I finished the last chapter. By the way, before anybody says it, I know I haven't got anytime in for Sasuke yet, he's going to basically remain a mystery up into a certain point of the story. Also, more characters are going to be introduced in the upcoming chapters. I know this was a boring chapter but it was needed for Naruto to develop a bit more into the character I would like him to be.**

**Just hit that button that says review as well, post what you think (love it, hate it, it's ok) that way I can make improvements.**


	3. Affliction and Instability

A/N:

_'Character Thought'_

"Character Speech"

**"Kyubi Speech"**

----------------------

Chapter 3

Kakashi was with Sasuke and Sakura as he explained the mission to catch the cat again. Sasuke seemed to care less about what they were doing and Sakura began complaining about how they as a team were not improving their teamwork and/or getting stronger. However, both decided to do the mission and it was successful, but Kakashi throughout the whole mission was wondering how Naruto was doing.

_'I hope he's ok, he should be able to handle some of that on his own. By the time I get back to his location, he should have completed the basic scrolls about chakra flow and the human anatomy'_

Kakashi went to team 7's location and retrieved the cat to take back to the Hokage's headquarters. He dismissed both Sakura and Sasuke claiming that the day was over and he had some stuff to do later.

_'I guess I'm picking favorites, Sasuke reminds me of myself in some ways but Naruto has more of a cross between both me and Obito, maybe that's why I like him so much. Sakura is much like Rin, while she was my teammate; I would prefer hanging out with Obito alone over hanging out with her and Obito.'_

Kakashi took the cat and immediately appeared outside the Hokage's headquarters. He brought in the cat and collected the money for the D-ranked mission. Kakashi then began giving the details of the mission and how it was conducted. The other shinobi seemed impressed with Uchiha and how he has grown.

_'I know he is the favorite of the village but I also have to give him credit on how much he has grown. I know he trains by himself and is rivals himself against Naruto but he has gained a lot of experience and his powers are developing more'_ thought Kakashi

Kakashi finished the report and then vanished in a cloud of smoke again, this time appearing outside of training ground 7. Kakashi saw Naruto, leaned up against a tree reading what one of the scrolls had to offer. Kakashi smiled a bit thinking how peaceful he looks. Kakashi walked over to Naruto, once Kakashi was within a few yards of Naruto, Naruto noticed him.

"Hi Kakashi-sensei, are you back here after that mission, so how did it go?"

Kakashi smiled a bit but wondered why Naruto was asking about his old team.

"It went fine; Sasuke did most of the work and eventually caught the cat. Their teamwork is improving even though they don't realize it yet."

Naruto smiled when he heard that Sasuke had taken over his position as the "cat-catcher". Naruto began laughing in his head when he thought about Sasuke getting clawed out by the cat.

"Naruto, there is something that I have to tell you about though"

Naruto's thought about Sasuke and the cat immediately vanished and he began paying full attention to Kakashi.

"I have a feeling that the chunin exams are going to be taking place soon. Probably right after my spar with you in 10 days."

Naruto had a look of questioning in his face, thinking about what possibly the chunin exams could be.

"So what exactly are the chunin exams?" Naruto questioned, finally thinking of the words to say after going through all the possibilities that the chunin exams could be.

"The chunin exams are a 3 part test in which the villages send all their genin to a certain location, the location this year happens to be Konoha. The genin compete in the chunin exams through 3 parts. I'm not allowed to tell you what any of the parts are but I can tell you that you have to be on guard at all times. If you pass all 3 stages of the chunin exams and show your fighting prowess then you will be promoted to chunin from genin."

Naruto put all that information through his head but still had a question.

"Kakashi-sensei, how strong do you think I am and do you think I will pass the chunin exams?"

Kakashi smiled while thinking how easy it will be for Naruto to make it to the final stage of the chunin exams, and then it was all up to the Hokage and his advisors to determine if anybody would be promoted to chunin.

"Naruto, I actually think of all the current rookie genin you are the strongest. That will be after I finish my training session with you in 10 days. I'm confident that if you fought against the entire rookie 9 that you would win against all of them, even Sasuke. Sasuke is your closest competitor though."

Naruto began to smile as his sensei was praising him for the abilities he had.

"Of course, that information is all based on the things I hear from the other jonin who have genin teams. They could be lying but I seriously doubt that they are. One more thing about the chunin exams is that you have to watch out for the other village's ninja. There could be an even stronger genin team from another village than the one's in Konoha."

Naruto had taken that thought into full consideration earlier when Kakashi mentioned that all villages would be sending their genin into Konoha for this exam.

"Another thing that I've wanted to ask you for a while Naruto is why are you going down this new path?"

Naruto looked up at Kakashi, kind of surprised he brought it up.

"Kakashi-sensei, I realized that the road to being Hokage is a longer road than I expected. It has many twists and turns and I have to be stronger to endure the whole path to get to being Hokage."

"But is there any other motivation besides than that, I mean you do have a crush on Sakura. Are you training so you can impress her and beat Sasuke so she will have a fangirl crush on you?"

"No Kakashi-sensei, I don't have a crush on Sakura anymore. What she did during our last mission together has shown me what a corrupt person she is deep down inside. I've decided that she doesn't even deserve any type of affection from me anymore. I've abandoned all thoughts of impressing her or trying to win her over. At the same time though, I've lost a lot of hate for Sasuke. I've actually begun to like him a little bit, I can understand where he's coming from now. What he sees in people and why he doesn't like them."

Kakashi was surprised by the answer Naruto gave him.

_'I can tell that Naruto and Sasuke are like me and Obito but in a different way. Both are very strong but still foil each other in many ways. Both are serious but Naruto still has that child-like side to him while Sasuke acts years above his actual age. They are alike each other in many ways, and Naruto finally realized that. I don't know about Sasuke though, he might have already realized this already. To be frank with myself, I haven't ever seen Sasuke actually make fun of Naruto.'_

"Well that's good to hear because during the chunin exams you are going to have to be apart of team 7 again. The chunin exams are done in teams and the Hokage won't let you do the chunin exams by yourself and doesn't want you to abandon your original team."

"That's fine, if I'm going to be the strongest out of the rookie 9 and Sasuke is the second strongest, I won't even have to worry about us even having teamwork issues, we can just out power everybody on our way to the last stage."

Naruto already had an idea of what the last stage is. Naruto had come to a conclusion that somewhere down the line that all the genins would have to eventually go one on one with each other to reveal all the true skills. That way the kage's would see all of their skills to make a decision on who becomes chunin or not.

Kakashi had picked up on Naruto saying "..to the last stage".

_'I guess he has intelligence but never showed it, he already knows what the last stage is. You would be proud of him Minato, but I hope you're proud of me as well for being his sensei'_

"Alright Naruto, that's enough chatter for the day, we've spent quite a bit of time talking already. Why don't you go take an hour break? And then return to do another hour's worth of training before calling it a day. I've got to go somewhere now so I'll be seeing you around."

With that, Kakashi vanished into a puff of smoke.

Naruto stood there in amazement on how Kakashi could just disappear like that. Naruto really wanted to be able to do that one day. Naruto's mind instantly went to the break and how he would spend it.

_'Wait a minute, there are quite a bit of training grounds around here, let's go scout them out since I'm not hungry for anything and I would like to work on my stealth and speed skills. Maybe I can catch a genin or two training and watch their techniques before these chunin exams start.'_

Naruto sped of jumping from tree to tree going to see if anybody was on the other training grounds.

-----------------------

(45 minutes later)

Naruto had been making his way around the training grounds in what shinobi would consider a jog, all Naruto had been able to pick up on was a few Konoha chunins practicing with each other. The chunins had some skill but Naruto wasn't very impressed with them.

_'I wonder after this training with Kakashi is over, will I be able to beat chunin like them?'_

Naruto was wondering this as he sped off to the last training ground to visit, training ground 44 the forest of death. Naruto arrived outside and looked at the fence which had "Danger" signs all over it. Naruto was reading about the forest of death and the creatures that lay within it.

"This is cool, maybe I'll convince sensei to come in and train after our spar and before the chunin exams start" Naruto thought out loud.

"What did you say about going in the forest of death gaki?"

Naruto quickly spun around and saw where the other voice had come from. It came from a woman behind him; she had a long tan trench coat on with a fishnet top and a brown mini-skirt covering the fishnet that she wore on her legs and hips. She also had purple hair that was pulled into a pony-tail in the back.

"Who are you?"

All the sudden Naruto heard a voice in his head, well not really a voice but more like a person throwing up.

**"Damnit kid, I hate the smell of snakes, it makes me hurl and it pisses me off"**

"Why?"

**"One of my two least favorite people on this planet smells like snakes."**

"I thought I was one of your two least favorite people, at least that's what you told me before I went to sleep last night, talking about my stupidity when it came to training"

**"You're my third least favorite person, feel happy? Now snap out of dreamland here and back to reality"**

Naruto came back to reality all the sudden and saw that the woman that had stood before him was now behind him, all the sudden Naruto had realized that he is bleeding from the cheek, and that the woman was licking up his blood.

"Your blood tastes good for some reason"

_'WTF!!?? Why is she doing this?'_

Naruto broke free of her grasp quickly and stood his guard in front of her, ready for a fight. The woman starting laughing as soon as he was in his fighting stance, Naruto was getting angry.

"Listen gaki, you are no match for me. I can tell that you're a mere genin while I'm a jonin. You wouldn't last more than a minute with me."

Hearing this, Naruto stood down and went back to normal.

"So what's your name gaki"?

"The name is Naruto Uzamaki, so who are you and why did you pierce me with a kunai earlier?"

"My name is Anko Mitarshi, the blood licking thing is a bad habit of mine. I have a question for you anyway, why are you outside the forest of death and why aren't you with your team?"

Naruto looked at the ground before answering, something was obviously troubling him about the question that Anko just asked.

"My team, I technically am with team 7 but I don't really feel apart of the team. For the time being, I'm training on my own." While Naruto was saying this, he still was looking at the ground

Anko felt something within her start tugging at her to feel sympathetic for him.

_'Who am I to judge him? The whole village has rejected me, wait a minute isn't this demon fox boy?'_

"I know that feeling gaki…"

All the sudden Naruto looked up into her eyes, he all the sudden he felt like there might be somebody in the village outside of Kakashi and Sarutobi that might understand him. The feeling of understanding, it was a good feeling to Naruto because not a lot of people ever were able to understand him; they always called him a "demon". After his return to from the land of the waves, Kyubi told Naruto that people rejected him because he was the holder of him. At first Naruto was mad but then understood. Naruto since then had gotten to like Kyubi for what it was and could go to Kyubi if he needed to talk about anything, although there was a little bloodlust that transferred over from Kyubi to Naruto, Naruto remained the same and had apparently gained another friend.

"I know what you're going through, don't worry. I have a feeling that your sadness will eventually come to an end"

_'This was the kid that Kakashi was telling me about earlier. He's got amazing potential and is also the holder of the nine tailed fox. He's going to be a great ninja, let's just hope for his sake that his demons don't get the best of him. Plus, with the chunin exams starting in 10 days, if he passes, his missions will be starting with other shinobi and kunoichi instead of his own team'_

"Really you think my sadness will end soon?" Naruto questioned, hoping for a positive answer, his team had put him in enough misery and on top of that, the whole village had rejected him.

"Yes, hey how about in about a week, I'll give you a tour of the forest of death"

"Really? You'll do that for me?"

"Don't worry about it, I won't mind, that is at least if you can hold your own against the monsters that lay within there"

"Don't worry about that, my skills will be developed within a week" Naruto said confidently, it was now brimming off him as Naruto was then a good mood again. It made Anko happy inside for some reason.

"Yes I'll give you a tour of that when you're done with your training. Speaking of which don't you have to be somewhere?"

Naruto looked confused for a few seconds before realizing what she meant and then a grim look appeared on his face.

_'Great, I'm going to be late back to the training grounds if I don't get a move on it, Kakashi is probably waiting for me back at the training grounds, if I make him too long he's going to suspect I'm at Ichiraku's.'_

"Bye Anko, I'll see you soon" Naruto quickly sped off but not before waiving to his new friend.

"Bye gaki, be careful with that training with yours"

_'Be careful, what am I saying! I sound like his mother. There is definitely something about him though. He said he's with team 7, if I remember correctly that's Kakashi's team. If Naruto is getting trained by Kakashi on his own, well then Naruto is going to be very strong the next time I see him. Still, I'm getting way too soft. Pull it together Anko'_

With that thought, Anko jumped back into the forest of death to get her mind of the recent conversation with a certain shinobi.

_'Training should get my mind off him for the time being'_

------------------------------

Meanwhile, Naruto was quickly jumping along trying to make it back in time. Kakashi had been appearing on time more recently, maybe it was because Naruto was so important to Kakashi now. Naruto quickly arrived with a few minutes to spare, Kakashi was already there.

"So you were out, where were you…Ichiraku's?" Kakashi asked with a straight face, even though on the inside he was smiling because he thought he had caught Naruto in a trap

"Actually I wasn't"

Kakashi nearly face-fell, he was positive he had him in a trap, Naruto was beginning to surprise him more and more of late. Kakashi had labeled him as unpredictable but he was becoming damn near impossible to read at all.

"Naruto, there is something that I want to teach you, it is not on one of the scrolls that I gave you with jutsu in them"

Naruto looked up, he was eager to learn a jutsu he could use in battle.

"I'm sure you are going to recognize this when I use it"

_'If my theory is correct, using the Kyubi's senses with this attack, shadow clones and a taijutsu skill that is better than most, Naruto should be a great chunin with this technique alone. I knew my sharingan would one day benefit me in big way outside of battle, I guess it's teaching others jutsu's like this'_

Kakashi spun through a few quick hand signs

"Suiton: Kirigakure no Jutsu" (Water Release: Hidden Mist Jutsu)

A thick mist enveloped both Kakashi and Naruto.

_'This is the technique that Zabuza used against Kakashi, no wonder this technique is so good, I can't see anything. Wait a minute…'_

All the sudden, Naruto felt a tap on his shoulder, Kakashi was standing right behind him. Naruto could hardly even see Kakashi at such a close range, Kakashi had really put more chakra into the move than Naruto thought he would, therefore making the fog denser. As Naruto looked at Kakashi, the mist disappeared and everything returned back to normal.

"That's how effective the technique is. You can use shadow clones with that technique as well and I'm guessing that your taijutsu is stronger than most people realize. That technique is only a D-rank but it is very effective. I don't want you using this move against many people though. I don't want many mist shinobi and kunoichis knowing we know one of their secret moves. If you run into a mist team at the chunin exams, use anything but that move"

Naruto understood, he had heard that there would be an imbalance if a village knew too many of another village's secret techniques. He knew Kakashi really couldn't help how he learned the technique and neither one of them wanted to be the cause of a war between Konoha and Kiri.

"I understand Kakashi-sensei. I'm going to try to master this technique quickly so I can go home, read some more and then go to bed early so I can train earlier tomorrow"

Naruto flipped through the hand seals as he remembered Kakashi doing them, the first time Naruto did the technique, the mist was a little thin and Kakashi who was standing in the mid-range attack zone could see him. Naruto completed the move 5 times after that, each time the mist got thicker until Naruto nearly made the mist as thick as Kakashi did.

_'The attack feeds off one's chakra to make the mist as dense as possible. It's no wonder he is able to almost produce the technique at the same level as I can in such a short amount of time without using a major training helper. He definitely has Minato's blood running through his veins.'_

"Kakashi-sensei, did you like that?"

"You did a good job Naruto. You are dismissed for the day"

"Thanks Kakashi-sensei, I need my sleep now, training for hours straight with no rest takes its toll on you"

"Bye Naruto"

Naruto used some of his remaining chakra to vault himself in the air and then he sped off towards his apartment complex.

_'He's sure growing; at least he's done for the day. That gives me time to go buy the new Icha Icha book when it comes out tonight. I'm so excited'_

-----------------------

(Timeskip to 2 hours later)

Naruto was sleeping and was having a good nap when a familiar voice popped up in his head.

**"Hey kit you there?"**

Naruto was groggy but woke up to see the Kyubi, he was in the familiar sewer in "his inner world" that was shared with the Kyubi.

"Yes I'm awake, no I'm not happy with you waking me up and what do you want?"

**"Don't get snappy with me! You forget who I am, I'm the great Kyubi, all who have met me have feared me"**

"I'm going to ask the question again, what do you want?"

Kyubi sighed to itself.

_'Kids these days, they know nothing and don't fear big scary monsters anymore. Them and their stupid wannabe shinobi powers'_

"You know I can hear what you're thinking Kyubi, and my powers aren't of a wannabe shinobi. Those powers are reserved for people like Ino and Sakura who are just fan girls and will never be kunoichis"

**"I agree with you on that Naruto, those people are the type I don't like and I'm probably never going to like them"**

With that Naruto got off his bed and began to put his ninja attire back on.

**"Where are you going?"**

"That's a stupid question Kyubi, if you can read my thoughts then you should be able to know what I'm thinking"

Kyubi was irritated because that brat had just outsmarted the great Kyubi. Kyubi then was smiling on the inside because the kid was growing, he had become smarter, had a pro-active approach to getting stronger and most importantly, Naruto was beginning to accept darkness and was bringing it into his life.

Naruto left his apartment and was heading towards his special spot.

_'I should have known this is where he was going. I'm actually kind of stupid for not thinking he would go here' _Kyubi thought to himself.

Naruto was jumping from roof to roof with ease, a lot of things a ninja should be able to do had become easy to him. Naruto could now jump from roof to roof without the people below him hearing that one footstep. That's a chunin level ability on its own, most genin would land and you would be able to hear the footstep from inside the building. Naruto quickly was doing this and arrived at his destination with ease.

**"Naruto, you see that 4th guy's image, I don't like him very much. This place is not a very kind place for me"**

"I don't care Kyubi, this is more of my own place, and I know why you don't like that 4th image. That's the one who sealed you"

**"Yea and I know something about him that will be given to you in due time, it won't be for me to tell you but instead the Hokage, but that's all in due time"**

Naruto thought about going to his inner world for a second to try to obtain that thought from the Kyubi but Naruto quickly surmised that he was bluffing and just wanted Naruto to get frustrated.

"Ok Kyubi, I'm just going to pretend like you never said that"

Naruto jumped to the top of Hokage Mountain and landed on the top. This was Naruto's favorite spot; you could see all of Konoha from this spot. For some reason this put Naruto's mind, body and soul at ease being at the top near all of the Hokage's. It was almost like they were looking out over him even though all the images were etched in stone and not real.

**"Hey Naruto, I have to ask you something"**

"What is it Kyubi?"

**"What are you going to do in the future?"**

"What do you mean by that, my future is here in Konoha"

**"I'm asking that because the villagers don't like you here, it's almost better if you left the village for a while. After that you could come back to the village if you wanted but if I were you, I would leave this village behind and go to a new village"**

"So you're suggesting that after the chunin exams that I leave this village?"

**"Not quite, not exactly right after the chunin exams but sometime right after"**

"Why would I do that? I'm pretty sure that Sarutobi is going to see these vast improvements from me and is raising me up to be the next Hokage"

**"Remember Naruto, to become Hokage you both need a vote of approval from the council and the people. Most of the people don't like you so you lose that vote quickly"**

"So, what about the council?" Naruto asked quickly, hoping to get a positive answer

**"Alright, I'll sum up the council since you don't really know anything about it"**

Naruto quickly was losing a sense of what was happening around him and was listening to the Kyubi's speaking more intently than Naruto had intended.

**"The council is made up of most of the elder jonin of the village. Some of the jonin on the council are the fathers of the people you went to school with, or the eight who graduated from the academy. The only one else who I know is on the council is your sensei Kakashi. So out of that, you have one vote to get the Hokage position"**

Naruto became depressed all of the sudden, Kyubi could sense this but he was just telling him the truth. Naruto now knew that getting the position of Hokage would be near impossible.

**"There is another way that you could get the position of Hokage"**

Naruto's hope was beginning to build inside of him, Naruto wanted to be Hokage more than anything in the world. He wanted to protect the village that he loved, even though they turned their back on him.

**"You will have to take the Hokage position by force. Meaning that you will likely have to make a wager against the Hokage to try to get that position. Something like you putting up your citizenship to the village versus attaining the position of Hokage. Of course, the council still has to find you as worthy but they would be so eager to get rid of you that they would pass you through without even thinking about the qualities of the position. You would instead only have one vote against that, Kakashi but Kakashi is a smart man, he might see that you could beat the Hokage and actually pass you through as well. You are going to need time to build your strengths though, give yourself about 5-6 years and you will be ready to take on the Hokage"**

The gears in Naruto's head begun to turn but then all the sudden Naruto became saddened again

"So in 5 to 6 years, I'm going to have to take on the old man?" Naruto asked

Kyubi had not thought of that, Kyubi had nothing against the 3rd Hokage and had actually begun to respect him since he always looked out for Naruto and had the best in mind for him.

**"I don't think the 3rd Hokage has much longer to live actually, it's just one of those instincts of mine that are telling me that. I don't know how he will die but I just don't think he has a long time to live. If that happens then you are going to be taking on somebody else. If the worst case scenario happens, you could be facing Kakashi himself."**

Naruto paled at the thought of that, he would have to take on his sensei and assume the position that Kakashi would have. Naruto regained his senses around him and looked up at the moon that was high in the sky. It was a beautiful night, no clouds were in the sky to block the moon and also block the light of the moon to shine down on the village. Naruto knew it was getting late and began his trip back to his apartment.

---------------------------------------------------

(Timeskip to the next morning)

Naruto rised from his bed and stretched his arms up. Naruto then got out of his bed and put on his ninja attire before making himself breakfast and heading out the door to training ground number 7.

Naruto arrived to training ground number 7 and saw Kakashi at the memorial stone to honor the fallen shinobi and kunoichi. Kakashi turned around, smiled and began talking to Naruto.

"Hello Naruto, I'm just a clone because I've gone off on a mission with Sakura and Sasuke. I'll be back in a few days. What I want you to do is continuing practicing ninjutsu, I will be back with about 4 days left to help you with some taijutsu maneuvers. After that our training will be done and I will spar with you to see how much you have grown. Anyway I'm disappearing now so good luck with the training."

With that, the Kakashi clone disappeared into a cloud of smoke and left Naruto there at the training ground by himself. Naruto spent the rest of the day training. Naruto had improved the Hidden Mist Jutsu even more and had learned another jutsu with the suiton release.

----------------------------------------

(Timeskip to 4 days left with the training)

Kakashi was getting back from his mission with Sasuke and Sakura. Sasuke was great as usual in the mission, Sasuke was showing great improvement with his sharigan and was able to take on one of the enemy chunin shinobi in one on one combat and almost defeated him if another one of the shinobi didn't sneak up on Sasuke and knocked him out. Sakura was well, Sakura…she didn't do much of anything but the only strength she has is chakra control but other than that, she still is useless. The mission was a success and Kakashi was collecting his reward for the C-ranked mission. Kakashi was dismissed and immediately transported over to training ground 7.

--------------------------

(Training Ground 7)

Kakashi arrived at the training ground and immediately began looking for Naruto. Kakashi figured that Naruto would be here since it was only the middle of the day and Naruto would likely still be training at this point. Kakashi was walking towards the memorial and then all the sudden the area became dense with mist, the mist was heavily dense and a person could not see a foot in front of him.

_'Well at least I know he's here, now all I have to do is find him. He's probably going to attack me to get a gauge of his strength. I should wait here for a few seconds'_

Kakashi stood in place for a few seconds when he noticed something attacking behind him at a rapid pace; the figure hit Kakashi in the back and knocked him over. Kakashi all the sudden burst into smoke and the other person laughed at the clone that was on the ground.

_'Still good as ever, I can hit him but he can clone his way out.' _Naruto thought to himself.

Naruto lifted the mist and Kakashi popped out of a tree that was nearby. As Kakashi jumped out of the tree, he noticed that Naruto had changed his wardrobe. Naruto still kept the black cargo pants but the orange jacket was gone and was replaced by a black jacket that had orange and red flames on the back. He looked more like a shinobi now; the orange had him stick out way too much.

_'I guess this is a way to say that Naruto really is taking his shinobi training seriously. That mist technique is getting really good as well; I wonder if he mastered the 6 jutsu's I left him. I bet he did though; he wouldn't have done anything else until he mastered those jutsus.'_

"I see you have changed Naruto, I also see that you have mastered the hidden mist technique. Did you learn the rest of the jutsus Naruto?"

"Yes Kakashi-sensei, I learned the rest of the jutsus and mastered some of them, I have almost mastered the rest. I must say Kakashi-sensei; the jutsus that you picked really complement each other. You gave me both some mid-range and long range jutsus, that was a really good jutsus that you picked."

Kakashi smiled when his student complemented his intelligence and actually appreciated the tactic Kakashi initiated.

"Thank you Naruto, so I see you noticed the jutsus complement each other. I'm impressed by that. Most people wouldn't notice that."

Naruto smiled and put his hands behind his head into "The Naruto Position"

_'Alright, I'm sure he already has good taijutsu skills but its now time to see how good he becomes after this. If this goes as planned he will be mid-high chunin level'_

"Our lesson on taijutsu begins tomorrow, I had too many people to fight on the last mission and I need a day of rest."

Naruto was expecting Kakashi to vanish in a cloud of smoke but he didn't, instead Kakashi walked up to Naruto and put his hand on Naruto's shoulder.

"How about we go to Ichiraku's, I can see you've been training hard and I'm exhausted from taking on 5 shinobi that aren't C-ranked ninja."

Naruto smiled and both Kakashi and Naruto headed off to Ichiraku's. Both enjoyed their ramen and were having a good conversation when another jonin showed up.

"Ah Kakashi, how are you doing?"

Behind him was a woman who was dressed in white and had red eyes with black spirals in them. She had the Konoha headband in its standard position over her forehead with the rest of it besides the Konoha symbol covered in her long black hair.

"Kurenai what brings you around these parts?"

_'I've heard of her some where, I think she might be another jonin with a team from the same academy graduating class as him. He hadn't really seen her before but had heard her name mentioned once or twice.'_

Kurenai noticed the younger of the two over on the other side of Kakashi with the black shinobi gear. She was intrigued that Naruto would be that open with the orange and red flames on his gear. Everybody who had seen flames has associated them with the nine tailed fox that attacked the village 13 years ago.

_'I can also tell that Naruto has gotten very strong, I can sense his chakra signature has gotten very strong. He is easily stronger than my whole team and his strength is above the rookie 9. He's only rivaled by Neji and Sasuke.'_

"Oh I was just walking around the village before I went back to training with my team. So what are you two both doing here during the middle of the day when you should be with your team?"

_'Oops, slipped on that one, I forgot that Naruto left his team to train for one and a half weeks. Hopefully he doesn't get mad'_

Naruto was angered by that question, surely this woman knew Naruto was training on his own or as the village had circulated "abandoned his team for his own purposes".

Kurenai looked up at Naruto who walked off and then sped off towards the east.

"Good work Kurenai, if you were as good with your genjutsu as you were with your words then you wouldn't be a very good kunoichi"

"Very amusing Kakashi, so how is Naruto progressing, I'm sure you got some time to visit him after you came back from your mission today"

"Yes Kurenai, I have gotten some time with him today and he has grown very powerful. You should know that he's probably the strongest of the rookie 9 right now."

"I already know that Kakashi. I already know a lot about him. As you know, one of my students Hinata Hyuga has a crush on him."

"Yes Kurenai, I know how to train him but I don't know about his personality. He has already endured so much and the darkness is beginning to seep into his life slowly. His personality has already changed from the once always happy Naruto to a cold Naruto who only shows his true happiness to those close to him. Unfortunately, he won't be able to make any new friends because people will see him as untouchable and with the inability to feel. That's the only part of him that I'm concerned about, other than that he's always going to be loyal to Konoha."

Kurenai looked at Kakashi, Kakashi was being brutally honest, and it was a rarity that Kakashi didn't know what he was doing. Kakashi had and still is the smartest person in Konoha and to see him puzzled about someone is a one in a million chance.

"I'm starting the last segment of our training tomorrow, it's going to be all taijutsu and he's already fairly good with that, so he will be chunin level with everything but genjutsu. He shows no sign of any ability to do anything but disperse a simple genjutsu. Then again, we all can't be as good with genjutsu as you Kurenai"

Kurenai smiled and had a little bit of a blush on her face.

"Thank you Kakashi, hopefully you will be able to dispel all the darkness surrounding Naruto. I don't want to deal with the consequences if you cannot get rid of it, one of the members of my team will never be the same again" With that thought, Kurenai pictured a certain Hyuga heiress down on her knees and crying knowing that Naruto would never appreciate the kindness she would have to offer him.

"I have to go anyway, my team is probably going to be showing up at our training location in a few minutes and I don't want to be late. That would mean I would have to use an excuse saying that I got lost on the path of life"

Kakashi smiled as Kurenai was obviously making fun of one of his favorite excuses for showing up late.

"Bye Kurenai, next time try not to upset my students so much when you are around them"

Kurenai disappeared with a smirk on her face, she knew Kakashi was being sarcastic and wouldn't say anything hurtful like that to her.

-----------------

(Back at Naruto's apartment)

"Fox I finally get it, I finally get what you were saying a few days ago. Nobody in this village appreciates me outside of the old man, kakashi-sensei and iruka-sensei. Did you see how she acted, asking the question like I wasn't even there or didn't know my situation. Am I this unimportant to the village? Like I don't even have any feelings?

**"You got to admit kit, she was kind of hot"**

"I don't notice those things because I see everybody in the village as corrupted because that's how they view me."

**"You have grown different; maybe I am starting to be a bad influence on you if you don't even recognize a woman's charms"**

"No fox, you are a good influence on me. Look what you have made me do. You made me realize that if I stayed the way I once was then I was going to be forever weak, and for that I am eternally grateful. I couldn't have looked myself in the mirror if I saw an older version of myself that was not Hokage."

**"Naruto, you really need to cool it right now, you're becoming too unstable, even for my liking. The last thing I want right now is to see you go unstable and ruin half the village. You really don't want to become a missing-nin and have hunter-nins all over your every move."**

Naruto sighed, and then finally realized he was getting a bit unstable. Naruto cooled it down and decided to get a quick nap in before he went up to Hokage Mountain for the night and then started his taijutsu training tomorrow morning.

----------------------------------------

(Timeskip to 3 days later)

"Alright Naruto, I think that will be enough for the day, your taijutsu has improved greatly and you are tired."

"Thank you for the training Kakashi-sensei. I'm looking forward the spar tomorrow, hopefully I can show you how good I have become."

With that, Kakashi vanished in smoke and Naruto quickly sped off back to his apartment. Unknown to Naruto but known to Kakashi, there was somebody in the trees near where Kakashi and Naruto were training. The trees allowed a perfect view of the training ground that the two had been fighting on.

_'You have become very good brother'_

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A/N: It's a cliffhanger, but it should be very obvious who had that thought in their head. This was a longer chapter to write since I'm back in school now, thank you guys for the reviews, I read all of them and take account of what you guys want and add it to the story if I think it's a good idea. School really drains me though and I'm in a lot of hard classes. I'm glad for this long weekend that I'm getting because I'm able to write this.

Remember, that big button down there that tells you to review is calling you to review this, give me your thoughts (whether good or bad) and then submit it, so I can improve my writing.


	4. Teacher vs Student: Battle of Judgment

**A/N: I know it has been a long time since I updated this (not exactly a long time compared to other authors but just for me) but I got some virus on my computer and it wiped out my internet connection and I wasn't able to get on here and put up my chapter that I had almost finished. Then I got some kind of flu (it wasn't swine flu) and was out for a few days. Thank you to all you guys who held out and didn't abandon this story because I hadn't updated in a while. The circumstances of it sucked and I was pissed about not updating the story. Sorry about the delay but here's the next chapter which features the battle between Kakashi and Naruto.**

BTW: Thank you to InARealPickle who pointed out that I accidently put 16 years instead of 12. I don't know what I was thinking, if I was at the time.

**Kyubi/Inner Sakura: Hi**

Naruto Characters: Hi

Jutsu: "Doton: Fart no Jutsu" (Earth Release: Fart Jutsu)

_Thoughts: 'I am thinking of something'_

Chapter 4

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_'You have become very good brother'_

This thought was wandering through his head as he thought about the other times he saw Naruto in action. Naruto had vastly improved from the boy he once was. These thoughts were all going through the head of Sasuke Uchiha.

_'His power rivals mine, while I don't think it surpasses my own, it is on my level. No way is this the same Naruto I remember as the dead last'_

To Sasuke, Naruto had always been the brother figure that he wanted Itachi to be. After Itachi left the village Sasuke became lonely and was always alone. People bothered him with their stupidity and lack of awareness he found fault in every person he met. Other classmates took this as arrogance but Sasuke was just really picky about the people he liked. Then, Naruto became apart of team 7 along with Sasuke.

_'He really has come a long way from the little annoying brat'_

Sasuke hated Naruto at first, thinking he would always be the dead last in the class because of the way he took the shinobi lifestyle. Sasuke then began to realize Naruto's potential after the battle with Zabuza. Naruto was a shinobi capable of great things and Sasuke realized this, he also knew that Naruto had potential to match his own power and they were both genin with chunin power.

_'Team 7 is very strong now, both myself and Naruto have great power, while Sakura seems to take the place of Naruto when he first became a team 7 member, she has very little to no power. Her only plus is her chakra control, but that can't save a person in battle unless they know how to use that control'_

Since the day he realized that Naruto had great power, Sasuke had Naruto become his rival, although they acted like enemies on the surface, Sasuke was sure that both knew it was a friendly rivalry among two people that consider each other to be brothers in battle. Naruto always seemed to push Sasuke to the next level and while Sasuke didn't exactly like the exaggerated cheerful attitude of Naruto, he tolerated it.

_'I'm sure that I'm the only one who knew it was a facade up until now, everybody sees what the darkness has done to Naruto. In that way we are both alike, we have both succumbed to some darkness within our hearts'_

Sasuke also knew that the façade had been in place since he knew Naruto. Naruto acted cheery on the outside but on the inside he was building his hate and anger, how Naruto kept it bottled up inside was a mystery to Sasuke. Naruto had all this hate and anger but chose not to release it on the people of Konoha, and to that they should be grateful. Sasuke thought to let it pass by because he didn't want to let Naruto know that somebody had found out about his façade. That might have made Naruto go further into a state of anger, but Sasuke knows that their friendship could have been stronger.

_'I'm going to want to fight him one day, which would be a great match between us. I better work on my sharingan before that match though.'_

Just as Sasuke had those thoughts cleared out of his head, Naruto flew by lower and looked to be headed back into town.

_'Phew, that was a close one. Naruto almost found out about me being up here and that's because I was careless and too wrapped up in my own thoughts'_

-------------------------------

Naruto was headed back into town so he could rest up before his fight with Kakashi. Over the past few days, Naruto had become a better shinobi in the arts of ninjutsu and taijutsu. The only weakness that Naruto had was genjutsu and Naruto himself knew it. People like Kurenai would have a field day with him.

_'Hmmm maybe I should stop for ramen before I go to sleep for the night. I hope Kyubi doesn't bother me tonight and let's me have a good sleep for tomorrow, I'm going to need it going against a jonin like Kakashi'_

Naruto stopped for ramen and was able to refuel before heading to bed peacefully, people had not bothered him for the day. Naruto was beginning to like this but he knew that people were still looking for a little kid with an orange jumpsuit instead of a darker, brooding person with all black attire.

_'Tomorrow is going to be the day, I'm going to be able to fight Kakashi and prove to him that I'm really a strong shinobi now. Then I can have a few more days of rest before these chunin exams starts'_

Naruto was beginning to drift off to sleep when he remembered something

_'That's right; I promised Anko a day in the forest of death.'_

**"You mean a date, right?"**

Naruto blushed at the statement that Kyubi made about Anko and himself.

"No Kyubi, that's not a date you baka"

**"Don't call me baka, I'm the great Kyubi I will annihilate you puny shinobi wannabe. Anyway, I'm saying that because you think she's attractive right?"**

Naruto began running images of Anko and himself on a date, Naruto began to immerse himself in a dreamland in which he and Anko were a couple.

**"I knew it, she's got your feelings just like that Haruno girl had your feelings a long time ago, and you've gotten way too clingy."** Kyubi snorted at its own comment about Naruto's feelings for women.

Naruto snapped out of dreamland and into "angerland" with the mention of one Sakura Haruno.

"No Kyubi, I was blind and naïve back then. I had no grip on reality and feelings whatsoever. They had no correlation but now I have finally matured into what an adult would say is a teen with thinking beyond his years."

**"I agree that you have gotten wiser and being able to read your thoughts, you have also gotten quite a bit darker as well. So tell me why do you like this Anko person?"**

Naruto paused and thought about what he was going to say to Kyubi, Kyubi was trying to get into Naruto's mind but Naruto was able to block out Kyubi for a minute while he was gathering his thoughts.

"I like Anko because she shares a similar path to my own. Unlike many people, you know that I'm a pretty observant person and pick up on things quickly, and the fact that I've broken into the files of the village shinobi and kunoichi many times. So I know about Anko's past, she's rejected by the village because she was a student of Orochimaru before he defected from Konoha. They fear that she will do the same exact thing to Konoha as he did. She's not that type a person and the rejection of the village hurts her on the inside, many people can't see this but I can, mainly because I went through the same things"

Kyubi began pondering something

"I like Anko because we share the same pain, pain is usually a negative but it can be used as a positive. Pain is a major theme in my life and I make bonds with my pain, exactly why I like Anko and why I call Sasuke brother"

Kyubi decided that Naruto indeed needed his rest and with that he vanished from Naruto's mind and back into its dark cage.

_'I guess Kyubi decided not to bother me anymore'_

Naruto drifted back into a slumber, he spent a little while imaging what the next few days were going to be like. He was looking forward to showing how much he had grown to Kakashi and then spending time the next day with Anko. Naruto knew that the bonds with pain were only half the reason he liked Anko but he was still wondering what the other half of it was, it was undiscovered. Naruto wasn't a big fan of surprises. That being, since Naruto discovered the Kyubi and the "surprise" beatings of the villagers. Naruto fell into a deep sleep in which for the first time in a long time, he was happy and actually looking forward to the next few days and what lie ahead in his shinobi life.

-------------------------------

(The next morning)

Naruto woke from his peaceful dream, one of the first since he had graduated from the academy. For Naruto, life was chaos and turmoil. He had relatively no friends and was hated for the thing sealed inside of him. This alone drove him insane on the inside, while showing no effect of it on the outside. Things never got better for Naruto once he woke up; he always wanted to stay asleep but never was able to. This day was no different, except Naruto wanted to wake up. Today he had a purpose.

------------------------------

(An hour later)

Naruto was quickly making his way over to the training grounds where he would be sparring with Kakashi. He didn't know what lie ahead for him or what Kakashi knew that he didn't. Naruto was sure that Kakashi knew techniques that Naruto may never learn, but Naruto knew he had power, a lot more than before and he was ready to show Kakashi.

_'I hope he is able to see that I have a new purpose in my shinobi life, I'm more determined and willing to take action. In a few days, it feels like I have matured well beyond my years'_

That was Naruto's thought as he was quickly jumping from building to building, at speeds which some Anbu couldn't even catch him at.

--------------------------------

(At the training grounds)

Kakashi was facing the memorial for those who have fallen in battle. He felt a chakra signature very familiar to him approaching. Kakashi took a deep breath and began walking to the middle of the field to meet the incoming shinobi; he knew that this would be quite the fight for him.

Just as Kakashi projected, Naruto arrived about 30 seconds later, Kakashi was prepared for him. Kakashi knew Naruto wouldn't sneak attack him and would rather face him with a face to face style of combat. Kakashi looked into Naruto's eyes and saw something different.

"Naruto, it seems your eyes have changed a bit, what's with that?"

"These are the eyes of a person who has something to prove to another. That's all"

Kakashi saw that Naruto's eyes had stayed the same for the most part but the black pupil in the center had an orange ring around it. It wasn't a massive ring but it was big enough where a person could notice it.

"So are you ready to do battle against me?" asked Kakashi

"Of course I am, just so you know. I'm going at you with killing intent" Naruto said with a cheerful look on his face.

Kakashi sweatdropped at the news he just heard.

_'Killing Intent? I thought this would be a bit easier than that, it means I'm actually going to have to protect myself'_

"Alright Naruto, if that's the way you want it then let's begin our battle.

-----------------------

(The Battle of Kakashi vs Naruto)

Naruto and Kakashi stood opposite of one another. Kakashi was wearily eyeing Naruto, waiting for the boy who he thought of as "impatient" to make the first move. Naruto did just that, reaching into his pack and throwing 2 shurikens at Kakashi.

_'Just like I thought, his personality and fighting style changed but somethings about him don't, like his impatience.'_

Kakashi easily ducked under the shurikens and threw 3 of his own from his pouch with lightning quick speed.

Naruto quickly got out of the way so the shurikens wouldn't hit him in the jugular, where the shurikens were aimed. Both shinobi stared each other down, waiting for each other to make the first move.

_'I'm going to wait for him to make the first move. Then I'll be able to see how he reacts to my speed development. I just have to think of a good way to get him defenseless.'_

_'Naruto is waiting for me to make the first move now; he wants to gauge my fighting style. I'll just use another weapon to counter that.'_

Kakashi took out a kunai and threw it at Naruto. Naruto who was expecting a physical attack quickly moved out of the way to avoid the kunai. The kunai missed Naruto and sliced into the middle of the tree. The kunai was lodged in the center of the tree when the tree tipped over and fell down with a thunderous 'Thud'

_'That could have been my head, looks like Kakashi-sensei is also coming with killing intent'_

Naruto took the initiative and made the first move this time. He charged at Kakashi and tried a kick to the mid section, Kakashi blocked with his arm. Naruto used the momentum to swing his leg the opposite way into a sweep that would have taken out an ordinary shinobi but Kakashi moved out of the way by jumping in the air. Kakashi saw an opening and attempted a punch that almost landed if Naruto had not moved out of the way at the last second.

Naruto had to duck under the punch by Kakashi while trying to recover from his sweep attack, the result was Naruto having to almost do a split but both of his legs luckily ended up in front of him. Naruto kicked away Kakashi's arm and rolled back onto his feet while Kakashi was still moving backwards from the kick's force.

Naruto formed a cross with his index finger and his middle finger from both hands.

"Kage Bunshin no Jutsu" (Shadow Clone Jutsu). 4 Naruto's formed along with the original Naruto. All 4 attacked at the same time. Kakashi was trying to decipher which Naruto was the real one and try to focus on isolating that Naruto. Kakashi was unable to detect which is the real Naruto before the shadow clones quickly got to him. Kakashi and the clones engaged in a short battle series where Kakashi defeated all 4 clones in a quick round of taijutsu in a short amount of time. The real Naruto was now hidden but Kakashi knew he was watching.

Naruto was now hidden in a treetop, after he had clone and Kakashi had focused in on the clones, Naruto henged and hid in the treetop. Naruto was planning his next attack as Kakashi was waiting. He knew that he was going to have to try to end the battle quickly. Naruto knew that Kakashi would have a better chance of catching Naruto off guard as the battle progressed due to his superior experience in battle and also the fact that Naruto had chunin level power to Kakashi's jonin level power. Naruto took out a kunai and began pouring some chakra into it, modifying the shape into a kunai with a curve shape; the edges also became sharper and grew a point at the center where the curve was.

Naruto finished the process and immediately threw the new kunai at Kakashi. Kakashi sensed it coming and quickly moved out of the way. The kunai continued through a tree. Kakashi thought he was safe now that Naruto revealed where his location was but wondered why Naruto hadn't popped out and started to battle in the open again. Much to Kakashi's chagrin, he didn't notice the same kunai that Naruto had thrown earlier was coming back to Naruto and Kakashi was in the way. Kakashi did notice when he heard an unfamiliar noise and moved out of the way but not before the kunai took a small piece of his silver hair from the back right side of his head. Naruto laughed when this happened and easily caught the kunai's handle when it came back to him.

"So Naruto that was a clever strategy. I don't get caught often with my guard down, your strategy was well planned and I didn't see it coming until the last second. However, I'm going to go ahead and level the playing field"

Naruto jumped out of the tree top and watched as Kakashi pulled up his hitai-ate to reveal his sharingan.

"You are going to use it now. I guess I really have improved that much"

Kakashi smiled and quickly went on the offensive. Kakashi went for a kick that would have landed on Naruto's chest if Naruto had not blocked with his arms. Kakashi threw a flurry of punches and kicks and Naruto was able to dodge most of them until Kakashi feigned a punch and hit Naruto in the chest with a kick instead. Naruto had both the air knocked out of him and was vaulted backwards with him landing on his back. Naruto quickly regained his air and stood back up.

Kakashi and Naruto started trading several blows in which each combatant would land one blow after throwing about 20 blows. To Naruto, this was a real challenge where he had to keep up with Kakashi to prevent himself from getting injured. To Kakashi, this was merely a game and a test to see how Naruto had improved. He was passing the test on taijutsu and Kakashi was about to switch to ninjutsu with taijutsu.

Kakashi quickly stepped back after making Naruto fly in the air with one swift kick. Kakashi jumped on top of the near by river that flowed by the training ground. Kakashi began quickly spinning through 44 hand seals that started with the Ox hand seal and ended with the Rooster hand seal.

"Suiton: Suiryūdan no Jutsu" (Water Release: Water Dragon Bullet Technique). A giant dragon formed behind Kakashi and sprayed out 4 large water bullets from its mouth and aimed them at a falling Naruto. Naruto knew that even if one of the bullets landed he would be done for. Thinking quickly he came up with a solution to the predicament he was facing. Naruto quickly did hand signs and spit water out of his mouth in a stream

"Suiton: Suijinheki" (Water Release: Water Encampment Wall). Naruto was surrounded by the water that he spit out of his mouth. The projectiles moved towards the wall and bounced right off and disappeared. Doing this defense used up quite a bit of Naruto's chakra supply. Naruto then let the water begin flowing to the ground but quickly thought otherwise in a split second and decided to use it for something else

"Suiton: Suihachi" (Water Release: Hand of Waves). Naruto had the water from the wall and some from his hand jet out quickly at Kakashi. Kakashi swiftly moved quickly and dodged the quick jet of water that was going at his head. Kakashi moved back onto the surface and began doing more hand signs.

"Kage Bushin no Jutsu" (Shadow Clone technique). Out popped two more Kakashi. Naruto thinking fast began another taijutsu spar with the clones. It took more time than expected but Naruto defeated both the clones. Even though he was a stamina freak, Naruto was beginning to get tired. A taijutsu spar mixed with ninjutsu was no easy task when you were fighting Kakashi Hatake. Naruto had to remember that he had chunin level power but Kakashi was a jonin, so spreading out his chakra would make this a much more balanced match.

Kakashi decided to move again but Naruto switched his game plan.

_'I'm going to try to end this quickly and throw all my remaining chakra into these final moves.'_

Naruto was letting Kakashi get a little bit closer before he revealed what he was going to do. "Fūton: Daitoppa" (Wind Release: Great Breakthrough). All the sudden, a great amount of wind was released from the location Naruto was and began to level anything in its path, its destination was Kakashi. Naruto couldn't see when the attack was released due to the amount of chakra he had used in the attack. Naruto opened his eyes after the attack was finished to see Kakashi was gone.

Unknown to Naruto, Kakashi had used "Doton: Dochū Eigyo no Jutsu" (Earth Release: Underground Move Jutsu). Kakashi had moved underground quickly so he would not be hit by Naruto's powerful wind move. Naruto began to think about where Kakashi would be and came up with a plan in a split second.

"Fūton: Senpūken" (Wind Release: Whirlwind Fist). Naruto punched the ground and inside the ground being released was a small whirlwind. The whirlwind ripped up the ground both revealing and injuring Kakashi, so it seemed to Naruto. Naruto was analyzing the downed Kakashi when all the sudden, Kakashi poofed to smoke.

'No, it was a shadow clone'

"Yield Naruto"

Kakashi was behind Naruto holding a kunai in front of his throat and instantly ready to plunge it in if Naruto didn't yield.

"Guess I have no choice, good match Kakashi-sensei"

Kakashi removed the kunai from Naruto's throat and put it away. Kakashi then deactivated his sharingan and put his hitai-ate back on over his sharingan eye.

"It was a good match and I think this was a success. You displayed good battle techniques and know how to use your jutsu together. I was very impressed with you using the Whirlwind Fist when I was underground. That was a very unique battle strategy and I almost had no time to react"

Naruto smiled but in a way he felt like he had failed. He was hoping that he would be able to injure Kakashi but the maximum he had accomplished was to take just a sliver of hair off Kakashi and the occasional punch or kick that barely landed.

"Don't worry that you hardly hit me Naruto. Remember that I'm a jonin and I possess the sharingan, it will be difficult to even touch me. The fact that I didn't take out the 'Icha Icha' book for you is a good accomplishment by itself, never less the fact I had to use the sharingan and almost use full force".

Hearing those words made Naruto feel better on the inside since his sensei was actually commending him for the battle techniques he had used and was pleased with how much progress he had made.

"Naruto you really deserve some rest after this fight but there is something I need to explain to you before I go"

Naruto sat down on the ground expecting Kakashi to go off on some long tangent about what was going to happen next for him, and unbeknownst to him, he was right.

"Now that this training is a success, you are going to have to join back up with team 7"

Naruto looked at the ground dejectedly at this point, he wasn't very happy about the news he had just received. He wished that he had a lot more time alone to hone and perfect his skills. The last thing he wanted to do was go back to his old team.

"I know this sounds bad for you but there is likely going to be no more missions between now and the time that the chunin exams start. The only time that you are going to be able to see your teammates is for group meetings in the morning"

"Kakashi-sensei, how do you know when the chunin exams start?"

This question took Kakashi off guard, he wasn't supposed to know when the chunin exams start but due to a certain event, he got to know ahead of time in case of special planning.

"In reality, I'm not supposed to know, but since you went off to go do your training on your own, Hokage-sama told me when the chunin exams were since they were so close to the time that your training ends. I expect that rival genin from other villages and the brown hawk that chirps to be here at anytime now. Likely in a day or two but not today."

Naruto looked up into Kakashi's eyes, that orange ring around his eyes with there again; it had disappeared after the fight but reappeared again now.

_'I'm curious as to what that ring indicates. It could be a plethora of different things. It could be a kekkei genkei, it could be some technique that Naruto does or doesn't know about and isn't telling anybody, or it could be the Kyubi giving him a kekkei genkei. I would doubt that Naruto has a natural kekkei genkei since his father or any relatives before him didn't have one. So that leaves the possibility of the technique or the Kyubi kekkei genkei. It's not the right time to ask about it, maybe some other time later'_

"Alright Naruto, I'm going back to report my findings to the Hokage. For now you should rest up because I know you used a lot of chakra during that fight. It was a good fight and the whole training was a success"

Kakashi disappeared into a whirl of leaves and was on his way to the Hokage's office. Naruto sat there on the ground just looking at it.

_'I wasn't able to even land a ninjutsu blow on him. While I did manage to land a few taijutsu kicks and punches on him, I wasn't able to land anything on him. I really still have a lot to learn though; I don't think I'm going to be able to learn anything before the chunin exams because I've got to go home and rest now. My body feels like its all mush.'_

With that thought, Naruto began to walk back to the apartment he owned but he was walking back at a very slow rate.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------

(At the Hokage's office)

"Report" said the Hokage

With that Kakashi entered the office of the Hokage, Sarutobi looked on with great interest in what he was about to report.

"The training was a success Hokage-sama, Naruto is a capable shinobi now."

"Ah that is good to here Kakashi, how much power does he possess"

"He is in the range of low to mid level chunin in every category except genjutsu, he shows no development at all in that category, the only thing he needs to learn is how to break free from them. The other thing is that I overshot his progress a little bit, he is low to mid level chunin, that being leaning a little bit more towards mid chunin, that is down from my original estimation of mid to high level chunin."

"It's okay Kakashi, his progress from the last place genin to mid level chunin is still very exceptional. I commend you for the work you did on his training. Myself and Naruto are grateful for all you did for him."

"One more thing before I leave Hokage-sama. When battling Naruto I noticed that he had some kind of orange ring around his pupil. It's very weird and looks unnatural; I had never seen it up until this point. It disappeared after the fight and reappeared again when I said about the chunin exams being in a few days. I honestly don't know what this is"

Sarutobi was in deep thought and he didn't know what it was either.

"I came to the conclusion that it could either be a family kekkei genkei, a technique that Naruto could be developing but has yet to tell anybody about it or the Kyubi is giving him a kekkei genkei or a new technique."

Sarutobi continued to think this new predicament over, he didn't know about Naruto's ring either. It was very odd that it would spawn out of nowhere all the sudden.

"I doubt it is a family kekkei genkei" Sarutobi spoke up but then quickly was in thought again

"I came to the same conclusion since Minato-sensei didn't have a kekkei genkei either. So that leaves the other two"

"It could be that the fox has talked to Naruto recently and given him some kind of advantage or is manipulating him somehow. We already know he has made contact with the fox once so he is able to speak to it now."

"Well the weird thing about the battle spar is that he didn't use the Kyubi's chakra at all, maybe he was concerned about hurting me or didn't want to use it. It was all of Naruto's chakra. He could have been testing out his own capabilities without the Kyubi's chakra."

"That's interesting, maybe by centralizing the Kyubi's chakra into two points, Naruto can be assured that Kyubi won't interfere on his battle but there must have been some kind of transfer if that was to happen. Naruto is an intelligent kid but he's not that intelligent to have already found a way to seal the Kyubi like that."

"These are all theories of course, that's all" replied Kakashi

"Yes, it is an interesting situation, one we will have to look at in the future" said Sarutobi

"That is all Hokage-sama"

"Good work Kakashi, you are dismissed"

Kakashi vanished into a swirl of leaves; nobody knows where he was going to, not even the Hokage. Kakashi could be a very mysterious figure sometimes.

-----------------------------------------

(At Naruto's apartment)

Naruto had just gotten back from the training ground; he was thoroughly exhausted from the battling with Kakashi. Kakashi was a strong opponent but Naruto was still depressed about not landing a blow on him.

**"Hey kit, I have a question for you. Why didn't you use my chakra source?"**

Naruto sighed to himself, he knew that question was coming sooner or later, he just didn't want to deal with Kyubi right now, and he was tired and exhausted.

"I didn't want to use your chakra because I wanted to see how I could do on my own, without your powers. I know how I can do with your power; it just increases my attacks power. I wanted to see what I could do without your chakra mixing in."

**"Very well, I have another question…"**

Kyubi was cut off by Naruto's snoring, Kyubi knew that Naruto didn't really want to talk but this was just blatant disrespect to the greatest of all the tailed beasts. Kyubi was thinking about waking him up but decided against it because he knew that he would need a long day of rest, especially if he was going to take that Anko chick up on her offer.

------------------------------------

(The next morning at the usual team 7 spot aka the bridge)

Naruto had just arrived at the bridge; he knew that Kakashi would want him here today since the chunin exams were on the horizon. The only problem is that neither one of his teammates knew he would be there. Another problem is that he will be alone with Sakura for a while, something he didn't want to encounter again though his former self would have begged for the opportunity. Naruto arrived with about 10 minutes until the deadline knowing Kakashi will be anywhere from 5-20 minutes late.

Sakura noticed a presence approaching nearby, she thought immediately it was Sasuke but noticed the wardrobe was different than Sasuke's usual blue shirt with khaki shorts, the person was dressed in all black and from afar looked like a very scary presence. She knew who it was since the person had blonde spiky hair.

_'He looks like a scary presence but he can't harm a fly'_ thought Sakura to herself.

**"I could take him down with the Haruno taijutsu set, CHA!"** screeched inner Sakura in Sakura's head.

Naruto drew closer to the bridge and noticed only Sakura was there, Naruto was hoping Sasuke was there in case Sakura got way to out of hand. Even then it wouldn't be pretty since Sasuke would either reprimand Sakura and she would go back into fan girl mode or he would do nothing and watch Sakura just lay into Naruto.

"So I see you got a new wardrobe, you look scary but you still can't harm anything" said Sakura to Naruto once he got on the red bridge.

Naruto just totally ignored her presence while she was talking about him. Sakura had become a corrupted form to him, just another fan girl who somewhat had potential to be a kunoichi but was dragged down by her fangirl acts. At this rate, she would stay genin for a while and then quit being a kunoichi but still have a fangirl status for Sasuke, the same goes for Ino. Naruto immediately dived into his inner world as he sat down leaning against the side of the bridge.

"Kyubi I need something interesting to talk about to kill about 15 minutes"

**"Well let's talk about later today; you have a 'date' with that Anko chick in the forest of death."** Kyubi greatly put expression on the word date.

"It's not a date Kyubi, I don't even know what the hell it is really. She probably just wants to hang out anyway. She's an outsider just like me. That's all.

**"But you can make it more than just friends hanging around with each other"**. Kyubi was just harassing Naruto know, the beast knew nothing would likely habits but pushing Naruto's buttons became one of the Kyubi's favorite pastimes.

"This was a bad idea to try to talk to you, I can hardly ever get a serious conversation in with you" Naruto was now thinking about breaking the connection between the Kyubi and himself, but decided to trust the Kyubi that it wouldn't say something that would make him sever the connection.

**"You know just because it is a twelve year old with a twenty four year old doesn't make it wrong"**

And it was going…going…gone

Naruto opened his eyes to see that Sasuke had arrived as well. Kakashi then appeared soon after, about a few minutes later.

"Well team, we look like we are in a better mood today, and look what we have here, a visitor returning to his squad" Kakashi said with a humorous intent in his voice.

Sakura and Sasuke looked over at Naruto who was still sitting on the bridge. All the sudden a brown hawk was in the air chirping noisily.

"Just as I thought" Kakashi remarked out loud. Just as Kakashi finished saying that, he reached into his pocket and handed each member of the team a form.

"These are for the chunin exams. Soon you will see rival ninja from each village sending their respective genin to this village to take this test. Just fill these out and give them to me by tomorrow if you want to participate. But if you don't want to participate and stay genin and do these low ranked D missions then don't fill them out and bring nothing but the rest of this team stays genin as well."

All three members of the team already had made up their minds. They wanted to take this test. Each for different reasons and purposes but all wanted to take this test.

"Alright you guys are dismissed"

As soon as Kakashi said those words both Naruto and Sasuke left without saying a word leaving a stunned Sakura on the bridge by herself.

_'When did Naruto get so anti-social as well? Is he trying to mimic Sasuke so he can finally get his undying love for me across? No matter, I'm always going to favor Sasuke over the brat anyday'_

Sakura was thinking merry thoughts of her and Sasuke having a future as she skipped away from the bridge.

--------------------------------

(Training Ground Number 44, Forest of Death)

Naruto had dropped the form off at his house and kept it in a secure place before heading off to the Forest of Death. It took him an hour to get there; most of it was spent at Ichiraku's getting another dose of ramen before heading out to the Forest of Death. Naruto was again, standing outside of the gates pondering what could be within the gates. All the sudden he felt a presence near him

"So you finally arrived gaki? I was wondering how long it would take you to finally get here. Don't you know not to keep a woman waiting? Especially one as beautiful as myself."

With that Naruto found that Anko had her arms wrapped around Naruto's midsection and all of the sudden he felt two creatures slithering out of her sleeves and wrapping themselves around his midsection. Naruto looked down to see snakes starting to constrict around his mid section. All the coolness had been sucked out of Naruto, he wanted them off and didn't care if he would make an embarrassment out of himself.

"AHHHHHH! GET THEM OFF ME THEY ARE SQUEEZING HARDER ON ME!!!!"

Anko began to laugh as Naruto released himself from her grip and started running around in circles as the snakes were still attached to his mid section. He didn't know that the more he ran around the more the snakes would squeeze him.

_'I wonder how much longer I should keep this up?'_ wondered Anko to herself.

While Anko was laughing at this, Naruto was not having such a fun time. He was running around in hopes of somehow being able to get them off him but that didn't work. Naruto in the spur of the moment decided stop, drop and roll might work on them. Anko quickly decided to release the snakes off of him and they vanished in a poof of smoke. Naruto was in such a state of panic that he didn't realize this and Anko got a chance to laugh at Naruto rolling around on the floor like a dog without any danger around him. Naruto was brought back to reality a few seconds later by realizing there was no more squeezing and Anko was laughing at him. He quickly got back to his feet.

"What the hell was that for?" yelled Naruto in a state of rage.

Anko continued laughing and almost fell down because she was laughing so hard. It took her a while but she eventually regained her composure.

"I just wanted to surprise you but I didn't know I would get that reaction out of you, I took it you were the more cool and collected type but was I wrong or what?" Anko said with a voice that sounded like she was ready to laugh again.

"Apologize to me now" Naruto said darkly with a bit of killing intent leaking out

"Nope, Anko Mitarshi doesn't say sorry to anybody" said Anko with a "back off" look on her face.

Naruto decided that he wasn't going to win this conversation if it was going to go anywhere.

"So are we going inside or not?" asked Naruto darkly, still mad about the whole snake fiasco that took place

"Quite the anxious and impatient one aren't you"? Anko said with a smile on her face

Anko went first and jumped the gate and then Naruto quickly followed right behind her. They started jumping around when Anko said something of importance.

"We aren't going too far in since I don't want you to be in too much danger of attacks from the creatures that lie within" said Anko with a military type voice.

Naruto wasn't too happy about this news but didn't outwardly express this, maybe he would have the chance to train some other time in here.

_'That was close. I just needed a good reason for not taking him deeper in. If anybody found out about this I would be removed from being the proctor of the second exam and that would be no fun. Even taking him this far in means that I have shown favoritism on one of the students taking the chunin exams. I'm facing a lot of punishment here if I get caught'_

"Hey Naruto, if anybody asks you where you have been, just don't tell them it was here. I don't like people knowing where I am"

Naruto knew there was something suspicious with that remark and request, Anko seemed like the type of person who didn't care of what people knew about her or not. It was a bit out of the ordinary and Naruto just nodded at her request.

_'Another close one, he could have slipped on that but I don't think he would have. It is ok just to make sure he doesn't slip and say where he was'_

Anko and Naruto trekked around most parts of the Forest of Death and had run into a few creatures. Most of them were dealt with easily and Anko got an understanding of how strong Naruto had really become. Anko and Naruto had been out for a few hours before when they first stop at two tree branches that faced each other. Anko took the branch on the left while Naruto on the right. Naruto was staring at his surroundings for about a minute before starting the conversation.

"So Anko, why do you want to become my friend? Not everybody wants to be my friend these days..."

Anko had been wondering that same question to her self but finally realized what the answer was while in the Forest of Death

"You have grown up in a similar path to me. The village has a universal sense of rejection towards me as well because of my past. Much like yours"

Naruto looked into Anko's eyes and could see the emotions that she didn't want to show. Unknown to Anko they were showing.

"My sensei left the village because he couldn't attain the position of Hokage. That's all he wanted, was just power. He used me as a person to attain the power he wanted and do cruel experiments on"

Naruto flinched visibly at the descriptions of those words. He knew the same thing, torture through experiments, just how the villagers beat him and wanted to see how close they could bring him to death without actually making him die. The game was called 'Naruto on the brink'

"I actually liked my sensei and didn't want him to leave but he showed his true colors when he left. He showed that he didn't really care about anybody but himself when he left. He abandoned everybody, his sensei, me and the rest of the village. He just left and became a missing-nin" Anko looked down as she was saying this

"What was his name?" asked Naruto

"His name is Orochimaru and he left the village a long time ago" Anko said with a tone of depression clearly evident

_'This person must have hurt Anko badly, I mean even I couldn't imagine if Kakashi-sensei left the village all the sudden.'_

Naruto made another spur of the moment decision and leaped over to the other branch, startling Anko and pulled her in closely to hug her.

"It's alright Anko, one day somehow he will fail and brought to justice"

"I don't know Naruto, he's really strong" Anko said, tears were on the verge of falling from her eyes.

"Then we just have to get stronger, and I've got an advantage over him, he may know about it or not but there isn't a way he can stop that" replied Naruto with a eerily confident expression in his voice

Anko and Naruto just sat like that for a while, not caring about the creatures and what they saw of the two just sitting there. Of course, there were no people around so they had no worries about people stumbling along and seeing this.

Naruto eventually made the move to get up and both him self and Anko went back to the entrance and jumped back over the gate. Anko and Naruto then just stared at each other quietly.

"I want to thank you for helping me get over my thoughts there. It is okay to admit it was kind of weird but I tend to get emotional with that subject"

"It is okay Anko, that's what friends do for each other. Anyway I have to go and it's getting late"

"Bye Naruto, see you soon"

_'He doesn't know how soon I'll be seeing him, if he makes it past the first part of the exam with Ibiki, knowing him he will.'_

Anko returned from her thoughts and noticed Naruto was gone.

_'It's okay, I opened up a lot to him and he accepted it, he's a true friend and one of the few I have. Plus we have a lot in common'_

-------------------------------------------

(Back in Konoha the next day at the team 7 meeting spot)

All the three genin were present and were waiting on Kakashi who had returned to his old role and was late. A few minutes later than expected Kakashi arrived.

"You're late!!" shouted Sakura

Kakashi noted how Sakura still shouted at him but Naruto didn't. This was going along the lines of how Naruto had changed and Sakura was still very immature.

"I'm sorry, one of my eyes wouldn't open this morning and it was a major inconvenience" replied Kakashi with a smirk on his face. Kakashi let the joke settle in for a few seconds and then went back to a serious tone.

"Alright, do you have your forms?"

All three of the genin handed their forms in and gave them to Kakashi.

"Good, the exams start tomorrow morning at eight in the morning, you guys are dismissed"

Kakashi poofed into smoke and all three genin went along their ways, all with a sense of excitement in their steps. You couldn't tell from the outside because they all went along their normal lives. Sakura was out with Ino doing "girl stuff" and shopping, Sasuke was back at the Uchiha compound training to become stronger and Naruto was on the rail of the Hokage Mountain looking down at the wealth of the genin in the village now. Even though they looked like ants to Naruto, there was a bunch of different characters out there. The lives of the genin of team 7 rolled along into nighttime where they all took rest at an early hour so they could be prepared for tomorrow.

--------------------------------------------------

(Timeskip to midnight)

The clock struck twelve and all was silent in the Village Hidden in the Leaves. The guards had a few nights of sound sleep (because nobody could declare war or infiltrate during the chunin exams at whatever location it was at, it was a treaty among the villages). The entire village was asleep except for one genin perched on the top of the roof where his team was staying. The boy had capabilities well beyond his years but couldn't sleep at all. The boy stared at the crescent moon high in the sky; he was staring at it in deep thought.

_'Mother, the blood which you have asked for will soon be delivered to you.'_

-------------------------------------------------------

**A/N: Chunin exams are closing in and I know some people hate this part but the matches will be different than the ones in the anime. There is going to be a few twists that you don't expect and some that you will expect. Sorry about the late update again, I couldn't help what happened. Hope you guys enjoyed the chapter.  
**


	5. The Exams Begin!

(Chapter 5)- Sorry its been a long time, my A/N explains why it was so long and some important details to look out for.

The sun rose awakening many of the genins who were in store for a huge day and one of the biggest days of their lives. The time for the chunin exams hosted by Konohagakure was here. Many of the genins were up early in anticipation for their big day, out of the genins none of them knew what was ahead of them but all were confident that they could face it and come out of it with victory.

* * *

Naruto woke up on at 7 AM, he knew that the instructions given to him were to meet his team outside of the first examination building at 7:30, Naruto made some instant ramen for himself and quickly rode off to the building where the first examination was going to be held.

_'I know I'm going to fly through the challenges, I'm pretty sure the same goes for Sasuke but Sakura is the one I am worried about. She thinks she is tiers above what she actually is, she actually thinks she is the 2nd strongest out of us three but in actuality is the dead weight. Hopefully we don't mess up because of her.'_

* * *

Temari was with both of her brothers, one was actually talking to her and the other was staring at the different objects in Konoha.

"So how do you think we are going to do against the other genins?" asked Kankuro

"We will be fine. We have one of the best teams, if not the best out of the genin teams. The teams from Konoha will be our biggest threat." Temari stated simply. She was positive that they were one of the strongest, if not the strongest team out of this year's genin class.

_'I just don't hope that there is a fatality here because somebody stepped in Gaara's way'_

Temari looked over at her brother, as much of a strength that he was for the team, he was basically a team by himself, and he had nothing to do with his older siblings and was basically out to fend for himself.

* * *

(First Examination Building 7:45 AM)

All the genins had already met up with their teams and had wandered into the building. All genins were instructed to make sure that they met in room 3.01. Apparently though, as Naruto walked in there were guards blocking the way into the room.

"Nobody can enter this room. We are sorry for the problems" stated one of the guards

"But our genin exams are in that room" wailed one random genin who looked like he was 40 years old

"I'm sorry but I cannot let you in this room" stated the other guard

A big fiasco was taking place between the guards and the genin who didn't recognize the trap.

'What's going on, they won't let us in' thought Sakura to herself

_'Genjutsu'_ thought both Naruto and Sasuke at the same time.

_'Now I want to make this exam interesting, let's have all of the genins make it past the "1st examination" here. If I put enough chakra into this, everybody will see the genjutsu'_ Naruto was thinking as he smiled.

Naruto began releasing a large amount of chakra.

"Release" said Naruto out loud.

All the sudden, the whole room went back to its normal predisposition. There were no guards blocking the door and it was revealed that everybody was on floor four not floor three.

_'What was that dobe doing, he made everybody see that it was genjustu, what a dobe'_ Sasuke was thinking to himself, he was not happy that Naruto was making this a challenge for his team.

Team 7 and the rest of the genins headed down the side stairs to the 3rd floor where the exam was taking place.

* * *

(Inside Room 3.01)

All of the genins that arrived were either sitting or standing in a big waiting room. There were several shinobi and kunoichi that were examining and counting both shuriken and kunai to make sure that they were heavily prepared for what was to come. Other shinobi were conversing with each other or meditating. One thing stuck out to Naruto, a purple haired genin was on the floor with a bunch of blank cards. The person would put a finger on the card and it would spin and the shinobi would be in shock. Naruto walked over to the man and asked him a question.

"What is it that you are doing with those cards?"

"I have information on other genin here, if you want to know about somebody then I'll just center my chakra into a card and it will appear with the person's affinity, strength and other information"

"Alright, let's see then, how about Sasuke Uchiha"

The man took out a certain card, fingered some chakra into it and the card spun. The card stopped spinning a few seconds later and Sasuke's face and stats showed up on the card.

"Says here that Sasuke possesses mid level chunin chakra level, with all around mid level chunin levels in every sort of ninja art, his stats are impressive and he possesses the sharingan, he's somebody to watch out for."

_'Hmm, how does he do that, I have no idea how he got that much information on Sasuke.'_

"Thanks for the information, by the way what is your name?" asked Naruto out of curiosity

"The name is Kabuto Yakushi"

Naruto remembered that name as he walked away, he then proceeded back over to where his team was, in a corner waiting for the exams to start; Sakura was close to Sasuke who had his eyes closed.

The minutes had been going by peacefully but then all the sudden the sound in the room erupted with two shinobi fighting; apparently an Otogakure shinobi and a shinobi from Kirigakure had gotten into a scuffle.

All the sudden a man appeared out of behind a door with a chunin vest, he appeared to be a proctor.

"First off, no fighting will be allowed outside of exams. If I find anybody fighting while exams are ongoing they will immediately be disqualified from the exams and then kicked out of the village"

The sound shinobi grumbled at this and went back to his team who were not standing that far away from the fight scene.

"Secondly, the next exam will take place in the next room, once you have entered the room you cannot exit unless you are disqualified or fall ill"

_'Disqualified?'_ thought many ninja.

"Lastly, the exam you are about to take is a written examination. There will be 20 questions on this exam, 19 will be given on the first part and you have 10 minutes to complete the last question, the last question will be administered by Ibiki Morino."

Many ninja thought that this part of the test was easy, until what they heard next.

"The catch here is that you have to be perfect on all the questions in order to pass, meaning you have to score a 20 out of 20 in order to make it to the next stage of examinations, and to prevent cheating, we made sure that there are 5 other chunin walking around the entire time, making sure that none of you are able to get away with cheating" stated the chunin with a satisfied smirk

_'Shit! I hate written examinations. Kyubi help me, I don't know what to do'_

**"Chill out Kit, I have a plan…"**

The genins all filed into the rooms and sat down where they were assigned by the chunin at the door, as the genins filed in, preparations for the exam were already being made by some genins.

* * *

One of the genins that were making preparations was a genin with sunglasses and a very high collar jacket. He had sat down and waited for all the other genins to sit down before a proctor signaled the start of the exam.

Shino Aburame flipped over his test and began looking at the questions, the first 10 questions were easy and all shinobi and kunoichi should be able to answer them, they were basic ninja questions. The next 10 on the other hand, were hard and nobody would be able to answer them with the 40 minutes left before the last question.

_'I bet this is a test on our stealth skills and how we can cheat and gather information, Ibiki Morino is an information gatherer with the interrogation department, and this is a deception test.'_

Shino let a small bug crawl to the top of his jacket and let it go, it began searching for a host who had the answers and found one. The bug memorized the answers using chakra and flew back, communicating with Shino and telling him the answers.

_'So they planted genins in here who knew the answers, this was a great ploy for a deception test, I wonder how many ninja are going to try to actually take this test, might as well flip over my paper now and go to sleep. Wow, how I sound like Shikamaru'_

* * *

Shikamaru was sleeping in the back, he knew it was a deception test and waited for the kunoichi in front of him to get the answers before he used a shadow technique to get her answers from her. Shikamaru had been asleep for at least 15 minutes now and 25 had gone by during the examination.

* * *

The proctors were circling the rooms like hawks. Looking for cheaters, they had already caught several genin and sent their team home with the cheater after they had been found cheating. The proctors were looking at another ninja when a sound erupted from the back of the class room. The genin was speechless who made the sound, their mouth was wide open.

"Number 56 you fail" Genma said outloud.

"B-b-b-but my pencil just disappeared" said the genin who was still startled

"The teammates of number 56 can leave now with him. Next time, don't pull that invisible pencil shit with us." Genma declared loudly, for all genins to hear.

The genin was crying as he was escorted out by guards at the door. The genin was yelling how it wasn't fair and he was set up.

(A/N: Anybody who can identify precisely what just happened will get mentioned in the next chapter, not as a character but will somehow be mentioned. You have to identify what happened and the person who you think caused that)

* * *

It was about 10 minutes later when the door slammed shut and a large tanned man with a few scars on his face walked to the front of the room.

"I'm going to give you an option to take the last question of the exam. Whether you decide to take it is only up to you and you alone."

Many of the shinobi were now confused at the predicament that was now facing them. Many were wondering what the question was going to be about.

"However, if you do not take the last question of the exam, then your whole team will fail and be asked to leave immediately"

The level of tension inside the examination room grew tenfold. Many genins were now questioning whether their teammates would let them down and bail out, others were wondering if they could even answer the last question, many genins egos would be hurt if their teammates weren't able to take the last question or even answer it correctly.

"If anybody who does not want to take the last question can leave, but I must warn you first, if anybody takes the last question and misses it, you will never be allowed to advance past genin."

The tension in the room went up tenfold again, many genin were scattering out of the room, leaving about 30 teams left to take the final question.

Ibiki waited until the last genin left until he spoke again.

"Congratulations, you have made it past the 1st section of the chunin exams."

A collective sigh of relief was administered from all of the genins left in the room, some let it out slowly and others let it out and collapsed on their desks. One said Hyuga heiress nearly fainted and it was not over Naruto.

"The remaining 5 minutes are given to cool down and rest before the proctor of the 2nd exam comes in, you can now meet up with your teammates"

The shinobi in the room all collectively got up and met with their teammates in some corner of the room, many were still on a high from actually passing the first examination and others were relieved that one of their teammates did not give up.

"So Sasuke-kun we advanced past the first stage, are you excited?" asked Sakura with happiness

"No, I knew we were going to pass" stated Sasuke simply

All the joy seemed to be sucked out of Sakura and she was looking for something to outlet her new found rage on, she looked around the room at the possibilities and found her favorite person to use her rage on. The said person didn't even have his eyes open or wasn't even interested.

_'What is that dobe doing'_ wondered Sakura

_'He seems like he has grown a lot darker since we went on the mission to the land of waves, its just really weird how this transformation came so suddenly.'_ Sakura then decided it had been enough time that she was thinking about Naruto and quickly tried to strike up a conversation with Sasuke but failed miserably.

* * *

(The other side of the room)

"So guys we are one step closer to our goal here of proving we are the number one genin team" said Tenten

"Yosh, our flames of youth burn brighter than any other team here!!" stated Lee loudly, earning looks of discontent from the other genins in the room.

Neji was simply observing his teammates trying to make a "team conversation" of course Neji wasn't going to participate, he was using this time to make sure he was scouting everybody in this room, he had to win this year because Gai held them back last year, they have a year's experience on all the other Konoha 9 and had to win over all of them, or risk embarrassment.

* * *

(3 minutes later)

The glass suddenly burst and a blur came into the classroom from where the window had shattered. This got the attention of everybody in the room, Shikamaru was no longer sleeping, Naruto had opened his eyes from his meditation and Sasuke stopped ignoring Sakura to look at the scene on display.

The blur revealed itself to be Anko Mitarshi. The banner behind her read "The Glorious, Sexiest and Single Jonin Anko Mitarshi, proctor of the 2nd chunin exam. Anko looked behind her to see the banner was perfectly donned where she wanted it to be and everything was in order, she looked over at Ibiki who had his face in his hands looking down.

"Alright brats, you might have gotten by Ibiki but he has gotten rather soft of late, don't think that my exam is as easy as his, easily half of you will be wiped out by the time my section of the exam ends."

Anko then looked around the room at the potential chunins. She saw a lot of the clan heads, including the last Uchiha, she then sensed a powerful energy and aura from a red headed kid from the sand in the corner and then she saw her favorite person in the room, the blonde headed knuckledhead ninja, Naruto. Anko then left back through the window after instructing the genin to meet her outside where she would take them to the next examination.

**"God I love that woman"** Kyubi said inside of Naruto's head.

"You know I can hear you Kyubi" Naruto stated simply

**"I know you can but she's sexy, powerful, and loves inflicting pain on others. That's all that I would look for in a woman"** Kyubi stated in a voice that could sound like that the Kyubi was daydreaming, if it could.

"I really didn't need to hear all of that Kyubi, you can keep some of that stuff to yourself. I just view Anko as a friend and nothing more." Naruto stated simply, and then proceeding to ignore Kyubi, who was talking about bedding the said kunoichi and making her theirs.

Naruto began observing the other genins as they walked to the ground where Anko was, by observing people walking, you could tell how much confidence they had in themselves. For example, Sasuke was confident who he was and knew that he was the best, or so he thinks or Hinata who keeps her head down and just wants to make it to the next exam and quickly pass it, hoping that she won't falter her team.

After walking for a while, the genins all reached their destination, the training ground known as the Forest of Death. Naruto smiled while others were in awe at the tall fences and the beasts that roamed inside of it.

"This is where your second examination will take place, inside the Forest of Death. You will be locked in for five days; this is a survival test so you will need to make it out alive to pass the test, no bringing deceased teammates to me and stating that you pass. There is a twist however; there will be two scrolls a heaven scroll and an earth scroll. In order to pass this test you will need to have one of both, each team will start with a scroll and try to obtain the other one, if you lose your scroll then you can try to get another team's scroll from them, use whatever means necessary to obtain the scrolls, so killing will be allowed."

All the genins were in shock at what they just heard, most were now scared of going in the Forest of Death because they could possibly die within it from other shinobi.

"The other shinobi in the forest aren't your only concerns. There are several animals in the forest that will eat you if you are not careful and there are also very poisonous plants in the forest. So I hope for your sake, that you know which to eat and which can kill you."

Now most of the genin were on alert, some were still cool, calm and collected about the whole matter and not worried the least bit.

"When you do obtain both the heaven and earth scroll, you will head to the tower in the middle of the forest, there you can open the scroll and will be given instructions on what to do next. No scrolls can be opened before arriving at the tower, any team to do so will be automatically disqualified, and trust us, we know when you do so. All teams will be given 20 minutes to talk it over and during that time, teams will be called over to get a scroll."

Anko then went over to the table with Genma and Kotetsu already there and began handing out the scrolls, where no other team could see them, or so they thought.

* * *

Gaara was a smart man, nobody ever gave him credit for that but he was very smart and adept to knowing what was going to come next. So when the proctor told him that they would give out scrolls over at the table, he immediately called upon the third eye to go scout out who had what scroll.

**"Hey Gaara, go take on that kid in the black, he feels like a good challenge"** said Shukaku in his head

"Go away Shukaku, I don't want to talk to you right now, nor do I ever want to talk to you. You don't give me any good information and all you want to talk about is blood and the patterns of which blood spill"

**"Well your in a pleasant mood today, wait you are always in a pleasant mood around this time of month, could you be on your period right now Panda-chan?"** Shukaku said with a girly tone in its voice.

Gaara broke the connection with Shukaku and kept studying who was getting what scroll. Gaara had learned how to be intelligent on his own, from both battle and from his life experiences. Growing up, Gaara had no friends because they all feared him and his siblings didn't want anything to do with him because they feared him as well. So Gaara had to teach himself everything that he knew and how to use certain techniques to his advantage.

* * *

About 10 minutes later, team 7 was called over to obtain their scroll. The past 10 minutes had been spent bickering on who would take the scrolls. Naruto didn't care and neither did Sasuke but Sakura insisted that Sasuke should carry the scroll since he was the strongest in the group, so Sasuke won the honor of carrying the scroll.

Anko was telling team 7 about the dangers and what may lie ahead, she then gave the team an earth scroll and told them to go back to the field with the scroll hidden. Just as Naruto was turning around to leave, Anko grabbed him.

"Now now, not so quick Naruto. You have to promise me that you will come out of the forest alive." Anko whispered in his ear

"Don't worry Anko, I'm going to come out of the forest of death alive. I'd be more worried about other people from Konoha dying, the red headed kid over there is very strong." Naruto said in an emotionless voice

"I'm just worried about you foxy-kun, now just go have some fun in there" said Anko, emphasizing the foxy-kun which was making Naruto go red.

Naruto was red in the face and Kyubi was howling away in his head, making sure that he would remember that for a long time to come. Kyubi followed it up with chanting "She wants you" in his head. Naruto was red for a few seconds longer but then put his "mask" back on so that nobody could read his emotions.

It was another ten minutes before all the genins were led to different gates with blood red numbers on them.

_'This is ironic, the numbers are blood red, maybe to lay homage to the people that will die in this forest. But whose blood is it laying homage to this year, will it be by my hands or be Sakura's blood, since she is the weakest. There is no loss if she dies.'_

All the teams were about to enter the forest when the chunins at the gates all made a signal and the genin teams entered the forest and the second stage of the exams began

* * *

(Start of the Forest of Death examination #2)

All the genin teams had successfully entered the outside perimeter of the forest of death, not approaching the monsters that lay within yet but enough into the forest where the poisonous berries could take a toll on them.

Team 10 had entered and immediately started to rely on Shikamaru's tactician skills to help them cross the forest of death.

"We should set up on the outside of the forest, that way we know that all of the herbs and plants here are non-poisonous and we can keep ourselves rested for when we sneak attack a team. Since other teams will mostly be dehydrated and exhausted from the traveling and searching, that is when we strike"

Chouji and Ino were happily listening to the fact that they would be doing nothing over the next few days and then moving into the forest on day 4 to perform an ambush on a genin team with the opposite scroll.

----------------

Team 7 however had a different mission; they were going to get to the safe house as fast as possible in order to ensure passage into the next set of exams. They were being led by Sasuke Uchiha and were quickly approaching the mid to center part of the forest of death, in order to wait for another genin team to pass.

"Let's set up camp here near the base of this tree, we will wait to ambush another team. Sakura set up some traps on the outside here, hopefully we can catch somebody" Sasuke stated simply

Sakura was overjoyed when Sasuke told her to actually do something instead of the blond brat who was doing nothing. Sasuke actually put thought into who would watch and build traps.

_'Naruto is much stronger than Sakura, it's not even a comparison on power level, although Sakura has much better chakra control, it's not even close. Sakura can do most of the handiwork around the base since she can afford to expend the energy, and the fact is she will willingly do it so she can somehow win me over, which never will happen. I couldn't care if she died or survived after this. I and the dobe need to survive though that is the fabric of the team.'_

Sakura was doing the work setting up a few traps in the surrounding area while other teams were already in combat with each other.

* * *

The sand siblings had already found a genin team from the grass village. They were ordinary young genin who looked like this was their first time taking this exam and it was soon to be their last.

"Give us the scroll and we will allow you to live" stated Kankuro, almost bored at what was going to happen.

"No. We will fight with our honor and scroll at stake" said one of the genin, who seemed to be nervous, probably from looking at Gaara stare a hole in them.

Gaara stepped closer to the genin and uncorked his gourd letting the sand flow out from the gourd.

"Gaara, we can take care of them!" shouted Temari, hoping her brother wasn't going to do what she think he had in store for them.

Gaara ignored Temari and the sand had already begun encircling the genin who were shocked at the sight of it. Gaara made the sand swirl around the mid-section of all 3 genin and closed his hand, signaling the Sand Coffin. The sand crushed all 3 genin and then let them fall. 2 of them were dead on impact but one stayed alive as Gaara walked over to them, looking at which scroll they possessed.

"Hmm, a heaven scroll, just what we needed" stated Gaara in his emotionless tone of voice as he walked away, corking his gourd back up. He turned back and watched the remaining genin cough up blood and eventually die seconds later, all three heading off to the afterlife.

Temari was shocked to say the least at Gaara's actions.

_'I'm surprised he corked the gourd up so quickly, he's not talking though. Maybe the blood of more powerful genin is sweeter than the blood of other weak genin.'_

Temari was dead on in the implication. Shukaku had already told Gaara that more blood awaited him later and that they should head over to the safe house to rest up for the next part of the exams.

* * *

Team 8 had the easiest time with this exam; they were a team full of tracking genin, giving them a huge advantage at this test. Shino had already sent a bug out to find some of the weakest genin so they could also pass this exam easily as well. Everything was under control for the tracking team of Konoha.

* * *

Night 1 of the second part of the exam has pulled through and all teams are now resting with the exception of one, which was at the safehouse already which had stunned all the chunin and jonin in attendance. The sand siblings had passed through in a record amount of time and they had no scratch whatsoever on them. Gaara was on top of the roof, mulling over what could possibly happen and thinking about his lonely life. Gaara wouldn't reveal this to anybody but he was really lonely on the inside and needed a few friends, the fact that everybody feared him was also a hindrance to that and also the fact that he was a jailer for Shukaku was a hindrance. Although of late, Gaara had begun gaining more control of his actions, he was still unable to sleep but it was a start for the once psychotic red headed genin. He sat on the rooftops watching the stars go by, wishing he could be free like one of them.

* * *

(Day 2, Forest of Death)

Naruto had woken up bright and early for the day, he had hoped to get a few training exercises in but was rudely interrupted by some genin from the Kirigakure.

"Not more shinobi from this wimpy village. Here to collect the bounty of our team because we killed Zabuza and Haku aren't you?"

The three genin smiled and knew that they had outnumbered Naruto heavily but since he was part of a team that beat a swordsman of the mist, he had to be somewhat strong; little did they know how strong he really was.

"Kirigakure no Jutsu" said Naruto softly, inducing a think mist on the scene that blinded all three of the mist genin.

"How does he know our special jutsu?" said the girl genin.

All the sudden from behind all three were simultaneously attacked by Naruto clones with kunai to the back of the neck; all three went down and were dead on the spot. Naruto then checked the girl for a scroll and found an earth scroll, the scroll they needed. Naruto then took the bodies to the nearby water source and threw them in there, being sure to get rid of the evidence so Sasuke and Sakura would still underestimate him. Little did he know Sakura was actually half-awake and saw that happen in front of her sleep laden eyes.

_'Did I just see Naruto use that hidden mist technique that Zabuza did? No way he could have learned that, its just a dream with wishful thinking'_ thought Sakura, laughing to herself about that dream, hoping that her next dream could be an older version of herself and Sasuke doing some things together.

* * *

Team 8 had located their targets and had apprehended them easy using Shino's bugs to drain them of their chakra, team 8 had gotten their appropriate scroll and had begun to head to the safehouse for further instruction.

* * *

Team 10 was still waiting outside near the fence area of the forest of death, biding their time and trying to conserve energy, one genin still had to be on lookout while the other two were sleeping. Chouji was up eating chips and looking out for anybody who might try to take their scroll.

* * *

Team Gai (or team 9) was at the safehouse and was lounging around after making it there in the early part of the morning. Team Gai had already run into the sand siblings, it was not a pretty sight as Gaara and Neji had a stare down in which both egos needed a boost and both men eventually decided to save it for another day.

* * *

Sakura and Saskue were waking up and had already seen that Naruto was up and moving, doing some exercises to keep him self loose, Naruto saw that Sasuke was up. Naruto threw him the earth scroll and told him to keep it and head to the safehouse.

_'So the dobe must have run into shinobi during the night and defeated them, very impressive indeed. He has to be on my radar of the top shinobi here, he might very well be the top genin here next to me. I'll beat him no matter the cost'_

"So baka, how did you get the scroll, I'm actually very curious?"

Naruto thought about how he got it and decided not to tell her.

"I henged into a big scary snake and made them run away, one of the genin dropped the scroll on accident and I took it"

"That figures, because we all know you can't beat a true shinobi when you face off with them"

Sakura laughed to herself while Sasuke just sighed.

_'How oblivious is she? Obviously he defeated three genin to get that, I just wonder what her train of logic is because it isn't very stable. She doesn't realize that he is stronger than her.'_

"Whatever the case, we need to start heading to the safe house before we get mugged by other teams waiting for genin to run through."

With that, team 7 began the journey through the middle of the forest of death to the safehouse which they hoped was only a short distance away, so they wouldn't have to deal with the animals that lay within.

* * *

(Timeskip 2 days later)

5 teams had already arrived at the safe house. Teams 7, 8 and team gai were all there from Konoha, 3 members of the sound village were also there and the suna siblings were there as well. The chunin were expecting another team to arrive soon but didn't know who it was going to be.

"So who do you think the last team is going to be?" Kiba asked his team simply, wondering what they would say.

"It's down to two teams, it will be the needle nins led by Shigure or Shikamaru and team 10" stated Shino, not changing his calm expression.

Hinata was lost in her own world thinking about her crush and the way he had arrived with his team 2 days earlier.

_'I'm just so glad that Naruto-kun made it, I was beginning to worry about him, and he must have done something really good for his team while in the forest. I wish he was on my team instead of Kiba. Kiba is ok but he's way to arrogant for my liking, plus Naruto could get off the team with Sakura and Kiba could be with the person he has a crush on. Then I could be together with Naruto..'_

"Hey is anybody in there Hinata?" Kiba asked waking a hand in front of Hinata's face. Hinata's face went crimson as she was caught daydreaming about her and Naruto on the same team.

"I-I-I'm ok" Hinata muttered, a blush still on her face. The genin spent a little while waiting when the door opened and the other team had arrived.

Shikamaru and team 10 were at the door, Ino was smiling and Chouji still munching on chips. Shikamaru entered and saw that 6 teams were now present.

'This is going to be such a drag, too many teams are here'

The genin spent another day waiting around and preparing their minds for what was about to happen in the near future to them and their lives as shinobi of Otokakure/Sunagakure/Konohagakure.

* * *

(1 day later, Forest of Death over)

Anko had gathered all the genins in one spot inside the arena where the prelims were going to begin.

"Alright brats, you may have passed the second stage of the examinations but now we are going to have preliminaries because too many teams are here right now. We need to narrow this field down to 8 genins so we are going to have one on one matches until you guys are able to narrow down the field and then the next round will be at the Konoha arena in front of the village of Konoha and representatives from the other countries."

The heartbeat of most of the genin just jumped through the roof, not only was honor and pride on the line but a chance to show their stuff and get promoted to chunin.

"Hayate was supposed to be here to proctor this but he got sick and couldn't do this so I am the new proctor for this. The rules are simple, when your name appears on the screen up there you will fight the other person whose name appears up there, this will be an anything goes fight but keep it in the arena. No killing either, we don't want a fatality here, I'm sure some of you are going to be depressed about that" Anko gave a quick glare at Gaara when she said that.

"Alright let's get things rolling here, when your name pops up you will fight the person who is opposite of your name, all matches are randomized and you might have to fight friends, allies or teammates."

The generator made a noise and revealed the two names of the first participants, many of the genin gasped as they didn't think a match like this was possible so early into the preliminaries, one of the stronger Konoha genin was going to have to take an early exit from the exams from a bad draw. Many genin were thanking kami they didn't have to face either one of the genin up on the board.

* * *

A/N: Another cliffy and a shorter chapter than usual, I'm sorry it took so long but school is a real bitch. You guys can go ahead and guess at who is the first fight and then guess at the rest of the fights, I want to see how many of you can actually get some of the fights right. There are going to be surprises and the fights are unlikely to be ones in the anime. The first fight is going to be a shocker and going to give the preliminaries a big fight atmosphere.

BTW: In the upcoming chapters there will be character deaths, they are going to be controversial, some of you are going to either hate or like me because of the characters I kill off. Another note, there is going to be no invasion whatsoever, my story begins diverting from the canon storyline after the exams. So Orochi doesn't make an appearance for a while and Kabuto's sudden disappearance will be explained soon.

Until then, review the story, guess at what is going to come and have a happy turkey day.

Next chapter will be posted after Thanksgiving (likely Friday or Saturday) so be on watch for it.


	6. The Prelminaries Begin!

Chapter 6:

A/N: I promised a chapter right after Thanksgiving and here it is. This part of the story is where I begin to divert from the canon storylines and begin building my own. Expect many twists and turns and outcomes you never could have thought happen.

I'm thankful for all the readers of this story, in a little under 4 hours I got 1,910 hits on this story. I hope I can amass 2 K soon but that can wait. Thank you guys for reviewing and many got the question right last chapter. It was a kage bunshin henged into a pencil, I thought the invisible pencil theory by Genma was pretty funny though.

Another note, the names of the people won't be in this chapter, it will be in the next chapter. This is all the matches from the prelims. At the end is the bracket for the finals. Your names will be mentioned in the first of the two training chapters before the chunin exams, I have the scene written out and it's a pretty funny one. Look for it in chapter 7, until then enjoy the preliminaries.

* * *

The generator made a noise and revealed the two names of the first participants, many of the genin gasped as they didn't think a match like this was possible so early into the preliminaries, one of the stronger Konoha genin was going to have to take an early exit from the exams from a bad draw. Many genin were thanking kami they didn't have to face either one of the genin up on the board.

Aburame Shino vs Uchiha Sasuke

"Would Shino and Sasuke both come down to the arena to face off in the first match of the preliminaries." Anko yelled out, excited for the battles that were about to happen.

"Go Shino, kick the Uchiha's ass!!" yelled Kiba out loud, Shino gave him a head nod to acknowledge him.

"B-b-b-be Careful" stuttered Hinata as she was playing with her fingers but barely looking up at Shino.

Shino walked off as Sakura and Naruto were giving their encouragement to Sasuke.

"Alright teme, don't screw up already" said Naruto with his eyes closed, deep in meditation.

"Sasuke-kun, I know you are going to win!" said Sakura. Sakura tried giving Sasuke a hug but Sasuke simply brushed her off and began walking down to the arena.

After a few minutes, both shinobi were ready to fight.

"Match 1 Begin!!" Anko yelled.

Sasuke immediately activated the Sharingan, this was not an intimidation to Shino at all, unlike most ninjutsu's, his clan technique could not be replicated since Sasuke didn't have the necessary insects inside of his body for the techniques to work.

_'It's most likely an intimidation factor. I can still win this battle without using ninjutsu at all. Just dodge his taijutsu, Sasuke has been known to be reckless at times.'_ Shino thought to himself, remembering how Sasuke fought in the academy.

Both shinobi looked at each other stoically before Sasuke decided to make the first move. Sasuke quickly moved towards Shino and tried to kick Shino in the chest. Shino jumped backwards and let some insects crawl out of the top of his jacket.

"Ewwww" said Ino out loud.

"Let's go Sasuke-kun, make sure you don't get boxed in by those bugs!" yelled Sakura.

Sasuke moved forward again and tried to execute some more punches and kicks, trying to catch Shino with a taijutsu battle, effectively taking his insects out of the fight. Sasuke was unable to land any kicks or punches.

_'This is getting frustrating quickly, Shino is not supposed to be great at taijutsu, I bet he can only dodge and his actual attacks are weak.'_ Sasuke thought to himself as he jumped back from Shino when Shino's insects were threatening an attack on Sasuke's legs.

Shino thought it was time to take the offensive. Shino rushed forward towards Sasuke and tried to land a kick to the stomach and then a punch towards Sasuke's neck. Sasuke skillfully dodged both blows and moved back further towards the wall. Shino then released insects out of his sleeves and fired them off at Sasuke.

"Katon: Gōkakyu no Jutsu" (Fire Release: Great Fireball Technique). Sasuke yelled as he blew fire out of his mouth, the fireball approached the bugs and roasted all of them to ash, the fireball continued at Shino who jumped out of the way, the fireball connected with the far wall and died down.

Sasuke took this opportunity to go on the offensive and try to corner Shino so that the insects couldn't harm him and Shino would yield. Sasuke ran at Shino and tried to land a few more taijutsu kicks and punches but Shino dodged them all, ending with Shino ducking and sending another wave of insects towards Sasuke's chest. Sasuke only had one option, jump in the air.

"Katon: Gōkakyu no Jutsu." Another fireball shot out of Sasuke's mouth and had the same result as the last time. It crashed into the wall on the far side after Shino evaded and roasted the insects in the wave that they were in.

_'Alright, I have him on the ropes right now. I just need him to continue being aggressive in his actions until I can finally corner him with my insects' _thought Shino after watching his insects get roasted again.

_'Got him, I see an opening; I'll wait for his bugs to pass by.'_ Sasuke thought as a smirk appeared on his face.

Sasuke rushed in for what he thought was the final time; Shino released another wave of bugs, as expected to Sasuke. This time Sasuke was able to get around the bugs. Sasuke had an opening at Shino. Sasuke rushed at Shino with a high knee and hit Shino in the chest with the knee. Shino's ribs were in great pain as he was thrown back from the blow. The insects were turning around to attack Sasuke as Sasuke punched Shino in the face throwning Shino back into the wall. Shino hit the wall with a loud "thud!"

Sasuke turned around to the bugs and fired another fireball at the insects. The insects were again roasted into ash as Sasuke turned around to Shino.

"All right Shino, time to end this" Sasuke stated, knowing the end was near.

Sasuke took out a small cord of string as he jumped back from a wounded Shino. Sasuke laid out the cord on the ground and then yelled after he went through the symbols for Snake, Dragon, Rabbit and ending on Tiger.

"Katon: Ryūka no Jutsu" (Fire Release: Dragon Fire Technique). The flame caught fire on the string and traveled on the string ending on Shino's body, incenerating it. Sasuke smirked triumphantly as Shino's body was roasting but then suddenly something happened.

"No Shino, you can't die!!" yelled Kiba

It was revealed that the body was a bug clone and the bugs scattered towards Sasuke as Sasuke was reveling in his win.

"Sasuke look out!!" yelled Sakura

Shino's bugs were heading at a fast rate towards Sasuke and Sasuke managed to somehow avoid them all as they fell to the ground to ash. Unfortunately Sasuke didn't notice that Shino was behind him and had captured him in the bugs and were around his hands sucking the chakra out of him.

"Yield Sasuke" said Shino blandly

"No I will not yield. I am an Uchiha and my clan doesn't lose to other meaningless clans." Sasuke yelled as he did a few hand signs.

"Katon: Gōkakyu no Jutsu" yelled Sasuke as fire erupted out of his hands at Shino. Shino simply stood in place as the jutsu backfired and were burning Sasuke's hands with the bugs on them.

Sasuke was screaming and yelling for it to end. The bugs rushed up his outfit in order to escape the inferno around his hands. Kakashi quickly jumped down to the arena and executed a Suiton technique to put out the fire on Sasuke. Kakashi gave a signal to Anko.

"Winner of the first match, Shino Aburame" Anko yelled, if one knew her, you could tell there was a tinge of excitement in her voice. Naruto could tell this as he smirked when she said that.

The whole Konoha bunch was amazed. Kiba was going crazy on the other side of the arena. He couldn't believe Shino just pulled the upset of a lifetime over Sasuke, not only that but he outsmarted the number one in the class.

Kakashi and Anko worked to remove the bugs from Sasuke as Sasuke lay unconscious from both self inflicted wounds and the insects that removed his chakra. Once all the insects were removed they were able to call in the medics who stretchered the unconscious Sasuke out of the arena.

Up on the arena walkway, many of the genin were stunned at the events that just transpired. The rookie of the year just got taken out in the first round of the preliminaries, but some saw this coming since Shino was number two in the class and Sasuke was way overconfident when dealing with Shino.

Kiba was still bouncing around by the time Shino arrived back on the top of the walkway. He went up to Shino and hugged him. Shino had to restrain his bugs since the bugs were in the mood for more chakra.

"Finally somebody beat the Uchiha brat, his clan isn't so good now" shouted Kiba.

"Not so loud Kiba, you're causing a raucous up here. I expect you and Hinata to go out and win as well. I have faith that our team is the best one here" Shino said, devoid of any emotion but below his collar he had a geninue smile on his face, it was good to take out the rookie of the year, and put his name into the argument of the best rookie from his class.

Sakura stormed over to Kiba and slapped him across the face.

"Don't brag because Shino got lucky against Sasuke-kun. I bet that you couldn't beat him if you used your best techniques Dog-Breath" Sakura stated with her nose up in the air.

"S-S-Sakura I-I-I-I don't think we should be fighting here" stuttered Hinata as she was scared of a fight between Sakura and Kiba.

Kiba was ready to go against Sakura but was interrupted when Anko yelled that the next match was beginning. Unnoticed to all the shinobi who were watching the Kiba-Sakura argument, Kakashi had arrived back up on the top and was standing next to Kurenai.

"So Kakashi, it looks like my best student took out your best student huh?" Kurenai said with a smug look on her face.

Kakashi was about to answer when an object shifted and was going to walk by Kurenai but stopped and said something to her in a whisper.

"I'm going to let you in on a little secret, I'm Kakashi's best student, not Sasuke" Naruto whispered as he walked by to get a better view of the matches after having a little conversation with the Kyuubi as the Sasuke and Shino match was happening. Little did everybody know, Kyuubi was giving Naruto some motivation on why he should go half-way all out instead of barely fighting at all.

Kurenai was laughing in her head, not showing emotion out loud but just laughing. She had obviously forgot about what she felt from Naruto earlier in his chakra.

***Flashback***

Behind him was a woman who was dressed in white and had red eyes with black spirals in them. She had the Konoha headband in its standard position over her forehead with the rest of it besides the Konoha symbol covered in her long black hair.

"Kurenai what brings you around these parts?"

_'I've heard of her some where, I think she might be another jonin with a team from the same academy graduating class as him. He hadn't really seen her before but had heard her name mentioned once or twice.'_

Kurenai noticed the younger of the two over on the other side of Kakashi with the black shinobi gear. She was intrigued that Naruto would be that open with the orange and red flames on his gear. Everybody who had seen flames has associated them with the nine tailed fox that attacked the village 13 years ago.

_'I can also tell that Naruto has gotten very strong, I can sense his chakra signature has gotten very strong. He is easily stronger than my whole team and his strength is above the rookie 9. He's only rivaled by Neji and Sasuke.'_

"Oh I was just walking around the village before I went back to training with my team. So what are you two both doing here during the middle of the day when you should be with your team?"

_'Oops, slipped on that one, I forgot that Naruto left his team to train for one and a half weeks. Hopefully he doesn't get mad'_

Naruto was angered by that question, surely this woman knew Naruto was training on his own or as the village had circulated "abandoned his team for his own purposes".

Kurenai looked up at Naruto who walked off and then sped off towards the east.

"Good work Kurenai, if you were as good with your genjutsu as you were with your words then you wouldn't be a very good kunoichi"

"Very amusing Kakashi, so how is Naruto progressing, I'm sure you got some time to visit him after you came back from your mission today"

"Yes Kurenai, I have gotten some time with him today and he has grown very powerful. You should know that he's probably the strongest of the rookie 9 right now."

"I already know that Kakashi. I already know a lot about him. As you know, one of my students Hinata Hyuga has a crush on him."

Both Kakashi and Kurenai went their separate ways.

_'Wow, Kakashi had a nice lie going there with Naruto being strong. I couldn't sense any chakra from him. He's still the dead last and he will always be. I guess Naruto will always be poor in the shinobi department. I just played along with Kakashi for fun.'_

Kurenai was laughing as she was walking down the street and back to her house.

***End Flashback***

_'The thought of Naruto being Kakashi's best student is just plain laughable. He's the dead last, he's going to lose in the first round. I hope one of my students beats him so they get an easy pass'_

Kakashi looked at Kurenai trying to read her thoughts but got nothing, he stopped trying and looked back down at Anko who was near the board.

The names were scrolling across the board and one name was selected randomly.

Kinuta Dosu

The names again started scrolling and randomly popping up before coming to a halt on a certain demon's name.

Sabaku no Gaara

"Would Dosu and Gaara come down to the arena to begin the next fight" Anko stated loudly, less genin had to cover their ears from Anko's yells.

**'I wonder if she would scream like that for us kit'**Kyuubi said in Naruto's head. Naruto immediately broke off the connection between himself and the great nine tails to view the match.

Naruto opened his eyes again and saw that Gaara had arrived using a shunshin with sand and Dosu jumped down over the railing.

"Ready to lose brat?" Dosu said outloud.

Gaara remained motionless as he just stared a hole into Dosu, not wanting to prolong this match, he'd rather scout the others while they fought.

"Match 2, begin!!" Anko yelled.

Dosu prepared to go on the offensive quickly with Gaara not moving a muscle.

_'Dosu is in trouble, that sand that Gaara carries doesn't even make a sound as it moves.'_ Stated Temari in her own mind, knowing this was going to be a quick fight.

Dosu charged forward with his drill out, Gaara brought up a sand wall. Dosu thought that he could use his Vibrating Sound Drill to go right through it but the sand quickly grabbed a hold onto his arms, both of them. The sand tighted around his arms as Gaara brought his hand up to show Dosu. Dosu was screaming out in pain to stop it.

"Sabaku Kyū" (Sand Coffin). Gaara said softly as the sand crushed the arms of Dosu, breaking them immediately on the spot. Gaara then lifted up Dosu in the air using his sand.

"Gaara stop this instant or I'm going to disqualify you." Anko stated to Gaara as she brought out her snakes from her sleeve pockets.

Gaara realized he would make people suffer less if he got disqualified. So he let go of the sand around Dosu and let him plummet back to the ground. Dosu's back shattered on impact to the ground and left him completely immobilized.

"Dosu. No!!!" yelled Kin. Zaku jumped over the barricade and sprung at Gaara.

"You bastard, how dare you do that" Zaku yelled while charging at Gaara.

Zaku forgot that Gaara had not yet corked his sand and the sand that had previously crushed Dosu surrounded Zaku when he got within range and clamped around his arm. The sand then slung Zaku back first into one of the arena walls, Zaku's back also making a loud racket, indicating he had broken something on impact. Gaara then quickly looked up at Kin who was not moving. Gaara corked his sand and shunshined back up to where his siblings were.

"Winner by knockout: Gaara Sabaku" said Anko. "Now can we get the medics back in here again" yelled Anko.

Kin was mortified at what just happened. Both of her teammates were now unconscious and one hadn't even fought yet. Kin jumped down to Anko and told her that she was withdrawing so she could be with her teammates as they recover. She walked away with the medics as they took the limp bodies of Dosu and Zaku away.

_'He's strong. He's my biggest competition' _thought Naruto.

_'How does somebody not care for human life like he does'_ thought Kakashi

_'Damn, that was pretty impressive. I hope I don't face him in the later rounds'_ thought Kiba.

Most all genins were in a state of shock, yet again because Gaara had easily knocked out two genin, both from a fairly strong village.

"Alright, Kin has withdrawn and Zaku is in no shape to fight so the board is going to contain both Kin and Zaku's names and then opponents will be drawn for those two. Whoever's name pops up is going straight into the chunin exams final stage."

Every one of the genin was hoping that their name would be quickly displayed on the board for a free pass.

The board randomly starting producing names, everybody knew who was first.

Abumi Zaku

The names began flooding the board (minus those who fought and the sound shinobi)

Nara Shikamaru

Everybody was in awe; the laziest person just got a free ticket to the chunin exams finals. Chouji was trying to wake up Shikamaru, who was sleeping.

"Chouji, what do you want?" Shikamaru asked angrily

"Dude your match is up. The guy got injured so you get a free pass into the final stage" Chouji stated with a smile on his face for his best friend.

"Troublesome……..or not" Shikamaru said quietly for him and Chouji to hear before he went back to sleep.

The board produced names again, but everybody knew what was coming up.

Tsuchi Kin

Now all genin were on their toes hoping that they would be the one to receive immunity from a fight and would be able to get a free pass into the final stage. Finally, the lucky name came up.

Haruno Sakura

"YES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!" yelled the pink haired banshee. Sakura was so excited that she was jumping up and down.

_'Great a wannabe kunoichi makes the finals'_ thought Ino and Naruto at the same time, oddly enough those two would think the same thought.

Kakashi smiled, but knew that he was in a world of trouble now because he had to train an inept student to fight somebody stronger than her.

_'Imagine if she got Gaara or even Shino in the first round'_ Kakashi shuddered at that thought.

_'Since there is an anything goes rule out there, you can kill people in the final stage of the examination. She is going to get murdered unless she gets a lucky draw against somebody like Shikamaru'_

Kakashi just smiled at Sakura who was dancing around, yelling how she made it further than Sasuke. Kakashi on the inside was paling quickly.

"Alright, the next match is about to begin, the contestants are now being picked" said Anko loudly, but not as loud as she had been. Many genin were hoping she was losing her voice from the yelling.

The board had now randomly put a name up.

Hyuga Neji

The board was now scrolling the names of the remaining contestants.

Inuzuka Kiba

Neji smirked as Kiba excitedly jumped down from the walkway. Neji knew that fate had already picked him as a winner. Neji arrived down on the arena slowly after walking down the steps, thinking how he was going to beat Kiba, knowing it would basically be an all taijutsu match.

"Ready to lose, Mr. Rookie of the Year?" questioned Kiba outloud, Akamaru by his side barking loudly.

"Fate has already determined the winner here Kiba, just forfeit and save yourself some humiliation" stated Neji stoically, positive he was going to win.

"Match 3, begin!!" stated Anko loudly.

"Byakugan" Neji said loudly, activating his kekkei genkei and able to analyze the chakra pathways of both Kiba and Akamaru.

Kiba was quick to go on the offense, knowing if he could end this quick, the better off he was. Kiba went to begin a taijutsu set, he thought the best way to quickly prevent any quick moves from Neji.

Neji backed up into the gentle fist taijutsu set. Kiba went for a diving blow to the head first and missed as Neji swiftly dodged to the right. Neji went for an open palm shot to one of Kiba's chakra systems but missed as Kiba rolled out of the way.

Suddenly Akamaru transformed into a form of Kiba and went to stand over next to him.

"Now there are two of us" stated Kiba out loud.

"There is no way for you to beat us" stated Akamaru

_'So there are two of them now, I just need to shut down the chakra pathways of one and then attack the other quickly. If the first I attack is Akamaru, then it will transform back into the dog, if it is Kiba then I can quickly win the match without having to go against Akamaru. Either way it makes no difference, if there are two or one. I am still going to win this match'_

"Yosh!! Neji, let your flames of youth burn brightly" yelled Gai, making the heads of all genin and jonin-sesnseis turn around at his antics.

_'Great now, I have to deal with him as well, thankfully Lee isn't joining in right now'_

"Gai-sensei!!!" Lee yelled out

"Lee!!!"

"Gai-sensei!!!"

"Lee!!"

_'Ok, nevermind that thought about Lee not joining in. They are both equally annoying in my book.'_

Neji analyzed both Kiba and Akamaru as they jumped towards Neji for an attack. One of the Kiba's jumped at Neji to execute a few punches and kicks but none of them landed on Neji. Neji hit a palm to the lower leg of one of the Kiba's, effectively preventing chakra flow to that section.

The other Kiba lunged at Neji as the other Kiba hobbled backwards holding his leg yet preparing his hands for a few punches and kicks. The first Kiba was able to hold a better fight against Neji, but Neji was still dodging his punches and kicks, Neji did not see that the other Kiba with no chakra going to his leg had gotten behind him and had slashed him once in the back.

Neji cried out in pain as he sunk to the ground but was still quick enough to dodge a punch from one of the Kibas. Neji rolled around so that he could get back to a standing base facing both Kibas. Neji dusted the dirt off his shoulder as the Kiba's began to talk.

"See Neji, you can't beat 2 Kibas"

"You won't be able to beat us with that wimpy Gentle Fist combination"

This was getting to Neji and finally made him snap, he rushed at a startled Kiba and began hitting different parts of the body with the gentle fist. Neji had shut down some of the chakra pathways but not all on one of the Kibas before the other Kiba could help him out.

_'Alright, Neji is finally turning this around' _thought Tenten, happy to see her teammate doing so well.

_'I don't know who to cheer for. My teammate or my cousin'_ thought Hinata.

Neji was caught in the center of Kiba and Kiba's clone as they rushed towards each other, Neji moved out of the way and both Kiba's hit each other, giving both a sufficient amount of damage.

_'Just like Neji to think his way out of a situation like that'_ thought Gai, who was much calmer after he and Lee finished screaming at each other.

Neji then moved forward onto one of the Kibas and quickly moved in on it, the other Kiba saw danger and lunged for Neji, but Neji had it well scouted and palmed the other Kiba in the face, sending it into the air and landing on the ground a few feet away. The Kiba clone poofed out of existence, revealing it to be Akamaru.

"Alright so you're the real Kiba" stated Neji looking down at Kiba.

_'This looks bad for Kiba' _thought Kurenai.

Kiba quickly got up and went for the kill, as Kiba lunged at Neji's head, Neji skillfully dodged as Kiba rolled back onto his feet and went for a series of kicks and punches, which Neji all dodged before trying a haymaker where he thought Neji would be, Neji blocked it and hit 2 fingers into the neck of Kiba, right where his pressure point is. Kiba was stunned and fell backwards, landing on the ground and gasping for air.

"Winner of Match 3, Neji Hyuga" stated Anko, now losing her voice.

Neji quickly turned around and went back up the stairs. Kiba quickly regained his composure after being down on the ground for a minute. He picked up Akamaru and went back towards the walkway. He was proud of how they did, since they were giving a good fight to the previous "rookie of the year".

_'Oh well, at least Hinata is still left. Maybe she can face Naruto or Ino, they would both be easy wins for her'_ thought Kurenai.

Neji arrived back on the walkway in 30 seconds later, Lee and Gai were yelling while Tenten just smiled at Neji's performance. Neji brushed it all off and wanted to watch the other's fight, so he could gain an advantage for the final stage.

"The participants for the next match are being chosen" said Anko. Anko was cursing herself for taking this job, with her now losing her voice. Sarutobi, merely just laughed at what was happening.

Yamanaka Ino

The board then quickly gave the next name

Temari

_'Pfft, Ino is about to lose' _thought Naruto. Naruto was interested in the other kunoichi and what she had strapped around her back. Weapons had always intrigued Naruto. He never was able to get his own but wished he did.

"Would Temari and Ino please come down to the arena" said Anko.

Temari glided down ontop of her battle fan while Ino climbed down the stairs.

"Match 4, begin!!"

Temari quickly took out her battle fan and unsheathed it. Ino was wondering what was hidden in the fan or what it could do.

Ino quickly tried her clan jutsu. The shadow moved in a straight line but Temari jumped out of the way and used the time to open up her fan. Temari then pumped wind chakra into the fan and made a gust at Ino. Forunately for Ino, it was only one moon and Ino covered up, but barely able to after the shadow returned back to her. Ino blocked the technique effectively and Temari returned back to the ground.

Ino took out 2 kunai and threw them at Temari. Temari opened her fan to two moons and deflected it with the wind. Ino figured out that Temari had another moon and that would be the strongest gust. Ino then threw shuriken but was deflected by the two moons again. Ino rushed in with a kunai to try to pry some taijutsu action into Temari.

Temari saw this coming and smirked. Temari opened the fan up to three moons and whipped up a gust at Ino, which sent Ino flying backwards into the wall, Ino was knocked out from the blow as her head hit the wall first.

"Winner by knockout: Temari"

Temari produced more wind to glide her back up to where her siblings were.

"Nice work Temari" said Kankuro with a smile on his face.

"Thank you, now just go out there and win and we can all be in the final stage together" Temari said, while putting her hand on Kankuro's shoulder.

"Who do you think I'm going to face?" said Kankuro.

"It doesn't matter Kankuro, we are the strongest team, we can beat anybody here" Temari said, reassuring him.

"You're right Temari, I can take any of these chumps that are left" Kankuro said with a cocky undertone to his voice.

While Kankuro was talking to Temari, Asuma picked up Ino and returned her to the walkway where he set her down against the wall. Ino had yet to wake back up but the injury wasn't too serious and she would be up soon.

_'I knew that was going to happen. That Temari over there is a troublesome woman'_ thought Shikamaru, who surprisingly awake, after Chouji woke him up he couldn't go back to sleep.

"Next match is coming up!!" said Anko.

The board quickly went through the names again.

Hyuga Hinata

The board revealed the other name and again people were stunned at this match up.

_'I didn't want to fight him'_ thought Hinata

Most of the genin were cackling at who was going to fight Hinata, since she did have an emotional bond with him

Uzumaki Naruto

_'Easy win'_ thought Kurenai.

_'Ah Foxy-kun gets to fight now, this could be interesting. Against a member of a prestigious clan no less'_

"Would Naruto and Hinata please come down here"

Hinata was timidly walking down the steps. Getting encouragement from her teammates and jonin-sensei

"Hinata, this is going to be easy" said Kurenai with a smile on her face.

"He's the dead last, there is nothing to worry about" said Kiba, patting her on the back.

Shino had a different feeling though.

_'My bugs can sense it; Naruto has gotten a lot stronger than before. He's probably stronger than I am right now.'_

Shino remained calm with his prediction that Hinata would lose, choosing not to tell her so she wouldn't get nervous, which was the last thing they needed.

Naruto jumped down from the walkway and smirked at all the people looking down on him.

**'Ironic isn't it Naruto, they look down at you in everyday life and now they are looking down at you still. Show them that the dead-last is no longer playing Kittie games anymore. Make Anko-chan proud'** Kyuubi pumped into Naruto's head. Naruto was waiting for this. He was waiting to take some aggression out on somebody.

Hinata finally got down the stairs, playing with her fingers.

_'Has fate determined you will lose Hinata? I don't think you are ready to fight'_ thought Neji, knowing this would be interesting.

_'Pssh, Hinata is joining me and Temari as the only kunoichi in the finals'_ thought Sakura.

Again nobody noticed that Kakashi appeared beside Kurenai again. Kakashi smiled as she looked at him with her red eyes.

"I have a bet to make. If Naruto wins then you go out on a date with me, but if he loses then I will stop hitting on you" Kakashi stated with his "eye smile" intact. Knowing if she accepted, as he thought she would then he would easily win this bet.

"I accept Kakashi, don't think for a minute you're going on a date with me" Kurenai said, knowing she had already won the bet.

Kakashi poofed away and appeared next to Sakura, he nearly had an ear to ear grin but kept it inside of him.

"Match 5, Begin!!!"

"Don't be scared Hinata, you aren't going to beat me so come at me with killing intent" Naruto stated with no emotion in his voice.

Hinata was still hesitant on attacking Naruto.

"Are you scared that you're going to hurt your precious Naru-kun?" Hinata had a blush on her face that could have rivaled Sakura's when Sasuke was around.

"Listen, I don't have any sort of feelings for you, nor for anyone here. You all spit on me and abused me in the academy. None of you even tried to help me at all. But you could have done something Hinata, but instead you were so scared and couldn't do anything. You are weak and you are going to lose to me right now and I'm not going to go easy on you, if I get the chance I will injure you with no hesitation." Naruto said blandly, it was scary to many people how emotionless he was, nobody had so little emotion since Itachi was a genin. It made people shudder.

_'No way he can pull this off, he's the dead last'_ thought Sakura.

"Hey Naruto, you're the dobe you can't beat Hinata so quit bluffing and fight already" yelled Kiba.

"Hey dog face, you want a quick fight then you will get one" Naruto said emotionlessly again.

Naruto quickly ran through hand seals and yelled out the jutsu.

"Fūton: Daitoppa" (Wind Release: Great Breakthrough). A great gust came from Naruto and began hacking the ground and went towards Hinata. Hinata shielded herself using her hands but was unable to completely shield herself and was thrown backwards onto the ground.

Naruto saw the opportunity and quickly punched a startled Hinata in the face. Hinata was sent backwards again and landed on her back. Naruto then picked her up and put a knee her in the stomach. Blood began pouring out of Hinata's mouth and onto the floor.

Everybody on the walkway was in awe. Nobody thought Naruto was this strong.

_'I thought Kakashi was lying but he wasn't, he is completely manhandling Hinata'_ she thought, now aware that she might have to go on a date with Kakashi.

"Kage Bunshin no Jutsu" (Shadow Clone Jutsu). Naruto created 2 clones of himself, the real Naruto threw Hinata's limp body into the air and the other two clones sprung into the air. One was below Hinata's body and the other on par with it. Hinata's body finally began to come back down to earth and the clone positioned itself over top of her ribcage while the other was still moving up towards her. The clones connected with an almost fatal combination on Hinata.

The first clone had punched the back of her head while the other put a foot into her ribcage. The two clones disappeared before they could fall back down on the ground. Hinata's body was falling and finally hit the ground after turning over in mid air, she landed face down and out cold.

"Winner of match 5, Naruto Uzumaki!!" Anko said with almost no voice. She was beyond pissed but happy her foxy-kun won.

Naruto didn't even look up but looked down on Hinata's face down body. He walked over to it and stomped once on her head, making sure her face connected with the ground again.

"Pathetic kunoichi, you are worse than Sakura up there, you didn't even get to use your byakugan." Naruto then stomped her head once more for reinforcement but then tried to walk off but was met with a pair of red eyes.

"Naruto, please step away from my student please."

Naruto walked over towards Kurenai and again whispered something in her ear.

"Now that's what happens when you underestimate me. Enjoy your date with Kakashi, he will be excited about it" Naruto said smirking as he went off towards the stairs.

Kurenai was frustrated as she looked at her best friend Anko and then carried off the body of Hinata, who was now severely beaten up and her face was a mess, both from the fall and the two stomps on the ground.

_'He got lucky, although some of those techniques were powerful'_ thought Sakura.

Everybody else didn't move towards him but away from him when he arrived back up on the walkway. Everybody was literally scared of him, except one red-headed genin who knew exactly like he felt.

**'That rage is the rage of a holder Gaara. He must contain one of my brothers or sisters.'**

_'I realize that Shukaku, tell me something that isn't completely obvious, we know another of our kind when we see them in battle. He was completely ruthless, especially to somebody with an emotional attachment to him'_

On the other side of the platform, Naruto had his eyes closed and was talking to Kyuubi.

_'There Kyuubi are you happy? I made somebody feel the agony of being destroyed by somebody greater than them'_

**'I'm proud of ya kit, good job now wait for the next round and catch some rest'.**

* * *

(15 minutes later)

"Yo Naruto wake up. It is time to draw for the order in the final stage of the chunin exams" said Kakashi.

Naruto popped one eye open and noticed that the other winners were walking down towards Anko.

"What happened?" asked Naruto.

"Lee beat Chouji by kicking him into a wall during Chouji's meat tank technique and Kankuro used some sort of puppet to fend of Tenten's weapons, she got poisioned so she's down there in the medic room with the rest of them"

Naruto then jumped down and met up with the rest of the finalists.

"You are the 9 finalists for the chunin exams final stage. You will now draw numbers 1-9 out of this sack. Some of you will get a pass before two of the other contestants have to fight each other."

"So two of us have to fight early before we even get down to 8 contestants, that's just troublesome" said Shikamaru, yawning after the comment.

The finalists all drew numbers, some grinning at the numbers they drew. Anko then recorded all the numbers and told another chunin who went up and told the guy controlling the board.

The names of the participants were swirling around and then stopped in their locations. It read:

Bracket 1:

Match 1:

Kankuro vs Rock Lee

Match 2:

Haruno Sakura vs Uzumaki Naruto

Bracket 2:

Match 1:

Sabaku no Gaara vs Hyuga Neji

Match 2:

Temari vs winner of Aburame Shino/Nara Shikamaru

_'I have to fight twice to get out of the first round, troublesome'_ thought Shikamaru, upset at what happened.

_'So I get the psychopath over there, I wonder who fate thinks will win'_ thought Neji

_'Sakura? You can put me in round 2, wait I think Kyuubi is laughing in my head'_ thought Naruto

_'Yosh! My speed will beat his puppets, I will make you proud Gai-sensei!!!'_ Lee thought, his thoughts were loud as well

_'Great I get Mr. Speed over there, this is just freakin great'_ thought Kankuro

_'I get a winner of another match which could take a huge toll on them, but then I probably face my brother_' thought Temari

_'Naruto on the other side, I'll see him in the finals'_ thought Gaara

_'…….this sucks'_ thought Shino

"Alright you guys can head out with your jonin senseis. The finals are thirty days away, so get all the training you can get between now and then.

Many proud jonin senseis left with their genin. The Suna Siblings were the only team to have all three members in, team 7 had 2, gai had 2 and 8 and 10 both had one.

Sakura stared at Naruto.

_'Why do I get the ominous feeling he is going to beat me badly during the exams. Maybe I should be nicer to him'_

"Hey Naruto, how about we go out for some ramen? My treat" asked Sakura hoping it would work.

Naruto smirked on the inside, he would have previously jumped at that offer but he was feeling different now, he didn't care about the emotions of others anymore, he just wanted to finish the chunin exams and become chunin, go on missions and succeed and be a regular shinobi with extreme power levels, leading to being a Hokage one day. He was set on his goal and nothing else matter, although he still did have a few people in mind he wanted to be friends with.

With that thought, Naruto simply jumped away from both Kakashi and Sakura and headed back to his residence.

"So sensei, who are you going to train?" asked Sakura.

"I'm going to train Naruto in the morning and you in the afternoon, that's how I'm going to train you equally." said Kakashi with a smile on his face.

Sakura was not pleased with this news as she thought he would possibly only train her because she was an actual part of the "team" unlike Naruto.

"Well Sakura I have to go, I have a date to plan out for tomorrow" said Kakashi smiling over his bet today.

Kakashi poofed out of the area in a cloud of smoke.

_'I wonder who the unlucky woman is?' _thought Sakura as she thought of going on a date with the perverted sensei of theirs. She didn't know how right she was, it was a very unlucky woman, who made the fatal mistake of underestimating one Naruto Uzumaki. The same exact thing Sakura was doing right now.

(End Chapter)

* * *

A/N: Bet some of you didn't see that one coming at all. I'm sorry to the Naru/Hina fans but he needed to get all the emotional attachment off of him and I had been planning a Naruto/Hinata fight for a while, I orginally had Ino going to fight him but then scrapped that as I was writing this chapter.

I hope you enjoyed the chapter and be on the lookout for chapter 7 soon, it will be titled: "A sensei's heart split in two". Review my chapter please.


	7. A sensei's heart split in two

(Chapter 7)

A/N: I have decided to yet again change what I was going to do with this story (writing this is so much fun when you get better ideas). This chapter takes place in the span of 48 hours, the training chapters will follow and chapter 11 will begin the finals for the chunin exams, which everybody should be ready for by then. Without anymore to say, here is chapter 7.

BTW: I only included the first person to identify the method Naruto used to pass the chunin exams, congrats vegitunks1, you are in this chapter.

* * *

The night was beginning to dawn on the village of Konohakagure, the street was littered with genin that were either out partying or trying to make it back from surviving the last part of the exam. The streets were lit up and were crammed with people, word spread around about the results of the preliminaries, the results likely leaked from the number one town gossiper around, a certain blond haired kunoichi that lost to her opponent. The rumors had also spread that there were two boys that were extremely powerful and were so great that they almost killed their opponents. The description labeled one having red hair and one having blond hair. Nothing else was spread around much other than that and the "pride of the village" Sasuke Uchiha was beaten by the Aburame kid.

"I can't believe that Sasuke lost to the Aburame kid" said the manager of the shinobi weapon store to a customer that was chatting with the manager as he was closing up shop for the night.

"I can't believe that the Hyuga girl lost either, word was spreading around that whoever beat her absolutely destroyed her and she is in the hospital" said the customer

"Tenten hasn't been around here much lately, I didn't hear what happened to her, I hope she is alright, she usually comes in after her big fights and tries to see what new weapons could compliment her fighting style" said the shop manager with concern in his voice as Tenten was the next generation of kunoichi using weapons to fight.

The manager and the customer chatted for a while longer and then left, only to be surrounded by the other people and becoming lost in the crowd of jubilant people wandering around Konoha. There were shinobi from other villages and civilian people mixed into one crowd, the only time anybody could see that was during the chunin exams.

* * *

(Hokage's office)

"Alright, as you all know I am proud of the 6 remaining participants from Konohagakure and will cheer for them one hundred percent in their quest to winning the chunin exams but I need to know who is going to train with who, as I am going to limit you guys to one genin only, meaning that Kakashi and Gai are going to have to pick who they train with." Stated Hiruzen, looking at the 4 jonin teachers in front of him.

"Yosh! That shouldn't be a problem for me Hokage-sama, Neji is already going to train with the other members of the Hyuga clan." Gai stated in a loud voice. Everybody had their index fingers in their ears because of the volume at which Gai was speaking at.

"How about you Kakashi? You have both Sakura and Naruto in the final stage of the chunin exams, who are you going to train and you must come up with a way for the other one to train, so that one doesn't lose any ground on the other genin. I don't want any favoritism here." Stated Hiruzen

Kakashi thought about it for a minute but he had not made up his mind after the Hokage told him that he was only going to be able to train one genin and not both Sakura and Naruto. Kakashi was frozen in thought and was pondering both sides of the situation.

_'On one hand we have Naruto, he is easily one of the strongest, if not the strongest genin in the chunin exam finals right now, he is dangerous though and proved that with Hinata's destruction at his hands. If I train him then I might be able to shed some light on what has made him so dark of late and might be able to change him from his dark ways. He's like a second Sasuke on the team and I don't know how much more of two Sasukes I can take.'_

Kakashi was pondering the reasonable arguments for training Sakura as well.

_'On the other hand we have Sakura and she is in a bad position for the final stage. She is the least experienced out of all the finalists and has the least amount of skill level compared to the rest of the genins, also she is facing Naruto in the first round which is even more dangerous considering how much emotional damage she has done to him in the first place with ignoring him and always running after Sasuke, leaving Naruto in the dust. It's going to be judgment day for her if we can't find somebody good to train her in the case of me training Naruto because he most likely is going to try doing serious damage, considering how much he did to Hinata who didn't even attempt to hurt him in the academy. It makes me want to help her but part of me wants to watch her suffer and pay for the sins she did to Naruto. Oh what a predicament I have on my hands here.'_

"Kakashi, I will allow you to have tomorrow to make a decision on who you want to train and who will train your other genin that is not going to train with you. I will not allow for you to simply abandon a genin to fully train the other, is that understood Kakashi?" Hiruzen said with a stern voice

"That is understood Hokage-sama" Kakashi said quickly, wondering why the Hokage got so worked up about not training a genin.

"That is all for this meeting, you guys are dismissed" Hiruzen said back to his normal voice.

Asuma and Gai shunshined away quickly leaving just Kakashi and Kurenai there with Hiruzen staring at them, Kakashi made a notion for the door and they both walked out, leaving Hiruzen to take out his orange book and read more Icha Icha.

Kurenai and Kakashi were walking down the steps and talking about Kakashi's sudden predicament and how he was going to go about it.

"So that's quite the predicament you have there? Choosing between both of your students is hard, but I know what I would do." said Kurenai, trying to persuade Kakashi to see it her way.

"Then what would you do in my situation?" questioned Kakashi. Kakashi already knew what Kurenai was going to say and wasn't going to take it into consideration.

"I think you should train Sakura and leave Naruto to fend for him self" stated Kurenai, as if she knew what was best for Kakashi.

"Why should I abandon Naruto? He has always had nobody there for him, I think it is time to reward his great effort and his accomplishments, as of now I'm probably going to train Naruto."

_'I don't think she will be able to change that decision unless something drastic happens.'_

"Why do you want to train him, I thought the Uchiha was bad about brooding and darkness but Naruto is as bad as Gaara is. He hurt my precious Hinata, the one student I actually have had a positive impact upon, I have been working on getting her confidence level up and then all the sudden the shinobi she has always had a crush on goes out and comes close to killing her, nevertheless she is going to have some scars that last for a long time from that massacre." Kurenai said emotionally.

Kurenai might have been "The Ice Queen of Konoha" but she was fragile right now with her emotional state, her favorite student was beaten at the hands of a dark monster.

"Listen, I'm going to talk with Naruto tomorrow about that and what he did. It is almost like kami isn't happy with Konoha, as Naruto just destroyed the one person out of his graduating class that would have stuck up for him if she had been just a little more brave and had more courage" Kakashi said with a depressed tone. He was also worried about Naruto, he was worried about Hinata as well but Naruto was growing dark quickly, if this kept up much longer Naruto's chakra color could be black soon in Kakashi's estimation.

Kurenai and Kakashi were now outside of the Hokage tower and walking among the streets of Konoha, the scenary created quite the aura that only occurred when the chunin exams took place in Konoha. Kakashi and Kurenai walked among the common people that were all celebrating and some shinobi that were celebrating. Kakashi and Kurenai walked a little while longer before reaching their destination.

"Well I got to go but I want you to consider what I'm talking about. Train Sakura and leave Naruto alone, it might be better off for everybody because anybody who gets in his way gets hurt. I'll talk to you later about our date tomorrow night. I've got to go catch some sleep so I can be at the hospital in the morning to check up on Hinata, when she wakes up she will be in a time of need and I want to be there when she wakes up from her unconsious state." Kurenai said to Kakashi, Kakashi stood there not changing his emotional expression, he then was surprised.

Kurenai leaned into Kakashi and hugged him. Kakashi was stunned for a moment before he got a grasp on reality and hugged her back.

"Be careful tomorrow, and make the right decision" Kurenai whispered softly to Kakashi before she turned around and headed into her apartment complex, which housed many jonins and chunins.

Kakashi was frozen for a minute, he was actually in turmoil. The one thing he thought wouldn't change him actually did.

_'Maybe I should look at training Sakura, but that means I have to find somebody to train Naruto. I don't know who can train Naruto though, no chunin could train him because Naruto could take them out, this so troublesome.' _Kakashi thought, stealing a line from the Nara's vocabulary.

Kakashi turned around and started heading over to where he lived, he lived a little ways away from Kurenai so he had more time to think about the drama centering around who he was going to train.

* * *

(11:00 PM, Ontop of the 4th Hokage's head)

"So how do you think I did today Kyuubi?" Naruto said, curious of the response coming from his prisoner.

**'You did great but damnit, why do you have to sit on his head?'** Kyuubi said with a roar to his voice. **'Out of all the four up here, why does it have to be him, I have a grudge against this man.'** Kyuubi roared, in chaos from where Naruto was sitting.

"Whatever Kyuubi, so what do you think my timetable should be for training for the chunin exams?"

**'Well you are going to be trained by Kakashi, but so is Sakura but you can do independent training for the chunin exam finals but it is going to take a lot out of you. I would say don't even train at all but that Gaara is strong in his own right.'**

"Ah that reminds me Kyuubi, I want to pay Gaara a little visit before the chunin exam final stage begins"

**'Why would you want to pay Gaara a visit, the gaki is a psychopath'**

"There is some stuff that we need to talk about Kyuubi, I'm sure you have already noticed that Gaara and myself have a common bond, except you are a lot nicer."

**'Ah so you have figured it out, haven't you.'** Kyuubi said to Naruto, surprised that Naruto had figured it out.

"Yes, I know he is just like me, so which one does he have?" Naruto questioned the Kyuubi.

**'He has Shukaku, which explains the raccoon like eyes of his. Shukaku uses sand offensive and defensive attacks which coinside with each other, so it creates both the ultimate offense and defense, unfortunately it only has one tail worth of power but it's mastery in sand makes up for it.'** Kyuubi stated for Naruto.

"So I'm guessing all of that sand from the gourd is for Shukaku to use if I'm correct." Naruto said.

**'Yes, but Gaara himself could have some mastery over sand through a wind affinity, it is possible he has a wind affinity and Shukaku's powers, if he does then its major trouble for you. You might actually need my powers in a fight.'**

"All the more reason to pay him a visit before the exams begin, I need to get that out of the way." Naruto said before leaping off the head of the 4th Hokage and landing on the path that leads down from the Hokage monument back into the village."

Before he jumped down from the monument, he noticed a person sitting ontop of the roof of an apartment complex. The person had black clothing on and had a gourd on his back, it was the host of the one tailed Shukaku, Sabaku no Gaara.

_'I'm coming for you Gaara, I just have to wait for the right opportunity'_ Naruto thought as he jumped off the monument and back onto the trail leading down to Konoha.

* * *

(The next day, training ground 7)

Sakura Haruno had arrived early for training, but she knew deep down that Kakashi was probably going to run late even though this was a big day for both herself and Naruto.

_'Speaking of Naruto, how much power do you think he holds?'_ Sakura thought to herself, she was concerned that she might actually be hurt against Naruto.

**'It doesn't matter, true love always prevails and we will show Sasuke that we are the better teammate than Naruto, Shannaro!!!' **said Inner Sakura loudly.

_'Maybe Naruto will go easier on me since he has had a crush on me since we were in the academy'_ thought Sakura.

All the sudden a dark force approached training ground number seven.

_'That can't be Kakashi that kind of darkness could never radiate of Kakashi, he might be a pervert but he's quite the happy go lucky spirit, he can be serious at times but not this dark.'_ Sakura thought to herself.

_'Oh great, should I set up a trap or just go hide.'_ Sakura thought.

Sakura however, was frozen in place by the dark force approaching the training ground. She then caught sight of a figure approaching the distance a few seconds after feeling the dark force. The figure was dressed in all black with spiky blond hair. It was her opponent in the first round of the chunin exams final stage, Naruto Uzumaki. Naruto walked over without even acknowledging her existance and sat at the base of a tree, back against the tree and began to meditate. Inwardly, Naruto was laughing at Sakura's expression, she looked like a hopeless cause. Which she actually was but she looked like she was going to wet her panties.

_'Oh my god, I thought I pissed my pants, I have never felt something so dark before in my life. That was the essence of pure evil.'_

Inner Sakura, for once was speechless as well, she also hadn't felt anything as evil as that and overwhelming in chakra overflow. It's almost like Naruto had let the chakra go to scare Sakura into submission and he was right, it worked.

It had been 15 more minutes before Kakashi arrived and Sakura was startled at his arrival as well, still not over the dark energy of Naruto.

"Hey guys, I was running late today when a pretty girl needed some help and I thought I needed to help her." Kakashi said with a one eye smile.

Kakashi was surprised when nobody yelled at him, he expected it from Sakura but not Naruto, Kakashi instantly noticed something was wrong with Sakura.

"Sakura are you okay?" Kakashi asked, concerned about her well-being.

"I'm fine Kakashi-sensei, I'm just ready for the training to begin" Sakura said with a fake smile on her face, she thought she could see Naruto with a sinister look on his face behind Kakashi.

"Alright then, let's start training then" Kakashi said, still smiling.

* * *

Kakashi had split up and told Naruto to just spar with his shadow clones for the day, and Naruto did just that. He was praticing against his clones, gaining the one thing he lacked at the preliminaries…Experience.

Kakashi was working with Sakura on the other hand at some different taijutsu sets, he was sure that if he could keep the fight to taijutsu only, Sakura wouldn't be beaten too badly and he didn't know many genjutsus, that was something that Sakura would need if she was to beat Naruto or even challenge him, it was Naruto's one glaring weakness, identifying and dispersing genjutsus.

Kakashi glanced over at Naruto, who was training hard.

_'Maybe I should teach him that jutsu, he might need to know it if he is going to use shadow clones, plus it will complement his offense nicely, he won't even have to move to fight. He can simply overpower his opponents using as little or as much chakra as he wants.' _Kakashi thought to himself as he watched Naruto take on all the other Naruto's.

Sakura on the other hand was taking a break, learning some taijutsu sets was exhausting for her, Kakashi remembered and appreciated Naruto's inhuman stamina and how they could train hours on end without taking a break.

Kakashi was still thinking about his situation though.

_'If I train Sakura, I could make her into a much better kunoichi, she will be well rounded in every department except genjutsu, she would probably become the best kunoichi of her class, passing Hinata. However, I don't know how fast she picks things up and learns how to execute them. If I train Naruto on the other hand, I can teach him that jutsu, which takes time to learn because you can't do it with waves of shadow clones, it can only be done with one and one at a time. The drawback is that Naruto is so dark that he could use it for destructive purposes and against Konoha. We already have a person using this techinuqe that is against Konoha and giving the two of them this techinque is deadly, you could kill a person with one move, if done right.'_

Kakashi sighed to himself as he put his head down into his hands and was rubbing his face. Trying to reason a way that he could teach both of his students somehow but he could come up with nothing. The Hokage was very strict that both students needed teachers and Kakashi would only be allowed to teach one of them.

_'I get why he had me only take one, he wants all the genin from Konoha to be up to par with the Suna Siblings plus I would be exhausted training Sakura and Naruto every day, at different times of the day. It would just be too much for me physically and mentally'_

Kakashi was still hung up on what he would do as Naruto was training by himself with the clones and Sakura was trying to get the basics of the taijutsu set she was being taught, it was sort of like the academy style but had some complex manuevers to get out of kicks and punches and had some of its own style to it.

* * *

(A different training ground at the same time)

"What do you mean I'm not going to be training you?" exclaimed a woman

"My father wants to train me on using my insects and clan techniques at a much higher level. He believes that your training isn't necessary for this segment of the exams." Said Shino, surprised at himself that he said that much.

"Whatever then, I guess then, I have thirty days to myself then" said Kurenai, thinking about what she could do during that period of time.

_'I could hang out with my friends during this time, as I can't be put on missions until the chunin exams end, as all jonin-senseis need to be present. I guess I could go hang out with Yugao and Anko for the thirty days; we could have a lot of fun. Maybe hanging out with Kakashi wouldn't be that bad either, but he will have to train one of his students regardless.'_ Thought Kurenai, trying to further expand on what she could do in thirty days.

Shino then began walking back to his clan's estate, knowing that his father would be teaching him more developed techniques with the insects he hosts in his body, as well as the training being a lot more rigorious.

_'My clan techniques are good but lacking in some departments. I noticed this in the fight against Sasuke, he was able to evade my insects until he got tired and lost a lot of his chakra. I need to be able to finish my opponents off quicker and I won't even bother trying to trap Shikamaru, who is a lot smarter than Sasuke and a better battle tactitan. Traps will not work against him.'_

Shino continued walking back to his estate and Kurenai sped off in her own direction, off to the hospital to go check in on Hinata before going to find both Yugao and Anko to go hang out with them and do more "girl stuff" before her date later with Kakashi.

* * *

(Training ground seven)

Sakura was beginning to get the hang of the taijutsu set Kakashi was teaching her, the academy taijutsu had a lot of parallels with this taijutsu set and Sakura was beginning to pick up the little delicacies of the set that she was lacking. Overall, she was becoming a better kunoichi with great chakra control at the lack of the amount of chakra she had, but she could still be good at taijutsu and genjutsu at the expense of being overpowered by most others in ninjutsu.

Naruto was however, no where to be found.

_'This is interesting how Naruto left and we didn't notice until later. Maybe he got tired out and needed a break after all.' Pondered Kakashi, amazed on how he didn't notice until five minutes ago that Naruto had left and gone off somewhere.'_

Kakashi didn't think of it as major concern because he knew Naruto wouldn't hurt anybody that didn't cross him plus Naruto had become a lot stronger than Sakura and she needed his help more.

_'Maybe this is the reason that I need to train Sakura instead of Naruto, this is actually a good reason why Naruto doesn't need my training, and it still remains on who would actually train Naruto. It has to be above chunin level'_ Kakashi pondered, mentally sighing at the dillema on his hands.

Kakashi continued teaching Sakura the basics of the tajutsu set while explaning some of the intricacies of it at the same time, she was picking it up but it was still a slow process.

* * *

(Konoha hospital, room 233)

Kurenai had just arrived at the Konoha hospital where Hinata was located and the members of the Hyuga main family were there. Hiashi could have been cruel about Hinata losing to Naruto but was thrown into anger when he heard it was the "demon" that did that to Hinata. Kurenai was somewhat glad because Hiashi felt compassion for the first time in a while for Hinata, as she laid unconsious on her hospital bed, her breathing stable but nobody knew when she would wake up. The timetable said about a week. Hanabi was currently crying as she looked up at her big sister who was motionless, all because of Naruto. As Kurenai sat down, Hiashi, Hanabi and other members of the family all left to go back to the clan house, to see how the progress on Neji's training was going.

"I'm sorry this happened to you Hinata, you must be shocked at how rageful Naruto was against you." Kurenai said sadly to Hinata, who was just functioning on her basic, simple actions like breathing.

"I hope you wake up soon, so that you can see the chunin exams, and see your teammate Shino fight. As well as the other participants and your friends." Kurenai continued talking to Hinata.

"I know it's going to hurt when you wake up, the person you had a crush on beat you like that, beat you without mercy and continued the beating even after the match had been over. I'm sorry this ever happened to you, if I knew this was going to happen then I would have pulled you out of the exams like I thought I was going to, but my ego got the best of me and I'm now in debt to you. I'm going to make it up somehow Hinata, I will somehow make it up to you." Kurenai continued as tears were falling down her face, talking about how selfish she was not to consider Hinata's state when she entered her team into the chunin exam because all the other teams entered from their class. Kurenai wanted to show that she was the superior jonin-sensei, in the end she saw she was a failure.

_'Maybe Shino was right, I shouldn't train anybody because of my own ineptness at training genin the basics. I better go before I get too depressed.'_

Kurenai leaned over and kissed the unconsious Hinata on the forehead before taking her departure and wiping the tears away that formed in her eyes. She put back on the mask that she constantly put on and left the hospital to go find her friends. They would find some way to cheer her up.

* * *

(Naruto's Apartment)

Naruto entered his mindscape, it had been a while before he had done this, before the chunin exams and Kyuubi was happy to see that it got a visitor, albeit the visitor that is always expected.

**'What are you doing down here kit, need to talk about something?' **asked Kyuubi with a dark, menacing growl in its voice.

Naruto had already gotten used to the growl that Kyuubi had when it talked all the time, it took him a few times to adjust to it but Kyuubi couldn't help the tone which it spoke in, it was something the Kyuubi had and could not help.

"It almost seems like Kakashi was troubled about something today, when he was showing the basic taijutsu set to Sakura, she got a few minor hits in on him and that is not something that Kakashi would usually allow. I mean it is Sakura and her abilities are far from great and closer to pathetic. I don't know why I was head over heels for her" stated Naruto, awaiting response from the great beast as it thought for a few moments.

**'You are right kit, her abilities are horrendous and she will never be a great kunoichi. I don't know why you are opposed to ending her life during your match at the chunin exam against her. I do crave bloodlust, and that Hyuga girl's blood was good but I'm still in the mood for more bloodlust. I don't understand why you didn't give one more cheap shot to the helpless girl'** Kyuubi said, but Naruto cut it off before it could get on one of its infamous rants.

"That was enough for her, remember Kyuubi, she didn't hurt me during the academy and I'm actually doing Hinata a big favor here, I'm introducing her to reality. Just imagine if somebody such as Gaara or another chunin got to deliever that message. I agree with you, Hinata is pretty pathetic right now, but I feel she will be strong in the future." Said Naruto to the great beast.

**'I'm surprised kit, if anything you have become more of a misanthrope of late, hating every human that you come in contact with, although you are my jailor and I receive your thoughts, I still don't get what you see in some people. The Hyuga girl is inept at shinobi duties, she is carried by the bug boy and dog boy, and at least they were able to put up a fight against their opponents. She is fragile and weak; I do not understand why you didn't take the opportunity to break her spirit right there.'** Stated the Kyuubi, trying to get Naruto to see the light of his reasoning.

"This is where you and I differ Kyuubi, I still see hope for the humanity that lives on this earth, while most of them are scum and treat others like trash when they are as corrupt as the oppressed, most humans aren't that bad but that species is becoming few and far between. I'm not a complete demon Kyuubi, I can't be a total misanthrope because there are some great qualities I see in people that you are totally oblivious to. Anyway back to the main conversation, what do you think Kakashi is so worked up about?" Naruto was questioning the last part because he had never seen his sensei lose focus on a battle like that.

**'Maybe it's the red eyed kunoichi that he is going on a date with tonight'** stated Kyuubi, being sure of its answer being right due to superior demonic intellect.

"How did you know about that?" Naruto questioned.

**'Even though you have gained intelligence and have decided to be aware of your surroundings. You are still pretty dense kit, remember that I can read your thoughts and I can sometimes tap into your senses and see what you see and hear what you hear. Even if I do miss something that happens live, I can always just search your memories for something that happened and replay it, all without you knowing.'** Kyuubi stated, proud of how it found a way around the seal so it could still have some physical contact with the world, even though it couldn't make contact back with it.

"I don't think Kakashi-sensei would be too worried about something like that, he doesn't sweat the small stuff like that, he'll probably show up for the date late like always." Replied Naruto, proving he did have a superior understanding of his sensei instead of the beast inside of him having a superior sense of Kakashi.

**'How about that red eyed girl though? She is smoking hot, I mean that's one great body she has, her and Anko, plus those two look like they are actually friends. I'm sure you missed it when you were focused on how to get around the chunin exam competitiors but they talked to each other like they knew each other, I think they are good friends.' Said Kyuubi, warranting a eyebrow raise from Naruto as Naruto didn't notice they were good friends or even knew each other.'**

"I don't care about Kurenai-sensei, wait she doesn't even deserve the suffix "-sensei" because she isn't able to teach her students properly. I basically destroyed Hinata, and Kiba who was her worst student was miles better than Hinata and competed well with Neji, having him on the ropes more than once." Said Naruto, but not yet done with his anti-Kurenai rant.

"She is a hollow person, most people aren't able to see through that emotional façade she puts up but it's pretty obvious to people like me who have done it since I was a child. Her façade is more evident than Anko's "insanity and unfeeling" façade. Plus, she underestimates me and mocks me, I know that she didn't take my fight with Hinata seriously; she actually made me inflict more punishment on Hinata than I was originally going to do. You probably know how bad it was to hear everybody say "Going against Naruto, that's an easy win" to Hinata. It basically made my heart freeze and just play on insticts, thus me basically trying to maul and kill her. I just don't like people who are great looking on the outside but are empty on the inside, most people don't recognize this but it's pretty apparent when you look for it." Said Naruto,

Naruto knew from prior experience how being hollow on the inside was not going to help anybody in the future, this is when he created his nindo to "always protect his precious people" no matter what, although at the time his only precious person at the time was the third Hokage.

**'It's ok Naruto, let all that negative energy out, I don't want you going around killing people yet, at least if you go do that then become a hunter-nin so you can do that to people who actually deserve to die.'** Said Kyuubi.

"They have no idea what they do to me though, it's almost like they don't care, how the villagers look at me and mock me and spit on me and do everything to try to piss me off every day of my life. Nobody has taken more beatings than me or suffered more than I have done in this village. Just because I have had you inside of me for twelve years, they just can't live with it. But the twelve prior years of beating was all worth it Kyuubi, because I got to find out who you were and you've actually become my best friend through it all."

To say the great nine tailed beast was shocked was an understatement, although he could read Naruto's thoughts, he never paid attention to the thoughts about friends and other likes of Naruto, only to the thoughts of Naruto about girls and other subjects involving them.

**'Are you being serious, you have the Uchiha, Hyuga girl, Kakashi, Iruka, Anko and Sarutobi and you pick me over all of them.' **Stated the Kyuubi.

"Yes, although the last four have helped me a lot through the years, you have shown me the true path about Konoha and the true path that I need to take for the future is the path that you showed me. I cannot thank you enough for making me realize that there is more out there to being a shinobi than just the "will of fire" and "being a dutiful shinobi to your village". I cannot thank you enough for that, you made my life change and I will be forever greatful to you for it." Said Naruto, on the verge of tears but ever since he became more introverted, he never cried, the tears just couldn't come out anymore.

**'Well kit, I'm honored to be your best friend and I hope you realize that I may say some harsh things at time and may get on you but we are in this together, when you die is when I die. I was originally going to be a complete ass to you but even I couldn't help but feel sympathetic after you have been manipulated your whole life and brainwashed. I the great Kyuubi, strongest of all the biju is reduced to a sympathetic fox plush by a little boy. I'm okay with it though, after all those years I wanted you to have a good life and be better than what you were going to get if I didn't contact you. The reason I contacted you was for survival, but the reason I talk to you know is for your own happiness and so you are able to get stronger to protect your precious people.'** Kyuubi said, the biju had never showed this kind of emotion before, but Naruto was a special case. Kyuubi thought that its animalistic instict of being misanthropic to all humans because of what happened to it would never be broken. But a little kid who had nothing, and has had nothing all of his life has finally broken the bitterness and misanthropic ways.

"Thanks Kyuubi, this has been a really good talk, I'm heading out soon. Just tell me if you sense anything that's up with Konoha." Said Naruto as he jumped out of the window and Kyuubi went back to the back of its cell, protecting Naruto from any harm that comes it's way, Kyuubi after all the years on earth, had finally found a precious person.

* * *

(Bookstore)

Kakashi was just a tad nervous about his date later with Kurenai and needed to blow off some time before the date, so he hit one of his favorite bookstores, which sold a lot of smut and had the first copies of the latest "Icha Icha" book, which Kakashi had already read numerous times.

"Hmm, now what should I take a look at today?" said Kakashi out loud to nobody in particular.

He was looking around at all the different books, all the books contained one hundred percent smut, exactly what Kakashi liked.

_'Now what is this?'_ thought Kakashi as he picked up a book that looked oddly similar to Jiraya's "Legend of the Gutsy Ninja"

Kakashi flipped through the book and noticed that it was a more smutty version of the story with great sex scenes. Kakashi looked for the author's name and found it was a pen name they were using, it was labeled "vegitunks1".

"Well this seems like it's the new trend, using pen names instead of real names."

Kakashi shuinshined past the cash register and laid down his money, the cashier barely caught this and put the money in for the book, the book had been quickly run through the scan and the money taken, by the time the cashier looked up, Kakashi was off to read his smutty new book, taking the place of Icha Icha.

"Would you like a receipt?" the cashier said as she looked up and said it to no one in particular. The civilans looked at her like she was crazy, mumbling about people having hallucinations of late.

* * *

(7:30 PM Outside of Kurenai's apartment complex)

Kurenai was getting ready for her date tonight, she didn't think it was going to be that great but Kakashi had actually gotten reservations at a nice place for the both of them to have a good time. She was thinking about her feelings for Kakashi, they had grown of late and she had actually started to like the pervy shinobi, although if they ever had a serious relationship, she would do away with all the perverted books.

All the sudden her doorbell rang and she ran to it and opened it to see Kakashi waiting for her. He still had his mask on but was dressed in a white undershirt, a green coat with black slacks. Kurenai was looking at him with a smile on her face, something that was rarely plastered on her face.

"Well if you are going to stand there and stare at me, at least get out here so I can stare back at you" said Kakashi with a sarcastic underlying tone, but inwardly hoping she would accept that proposal.

Kurenai glared at him and then went out to get her shinobi gear in case of a rare attack, Kurenai was dressed in a purple kimono with black flower petals that were spread out across the kimono, it was elegant but not too flashym, something that fitted Kurenai's personality and attitude.

Kakashi and Kurenai left the apartment complex and headed out to the resturant. Kakashi was being a gentlemen and not a pervert the entire time. Kurenai was actually enjoying herself while she was with him, it wasn't expected he would be this good to her but she wasn't expecting a totally dull night.

They arrived at the resturant and got their seats after Kakashi showed proof of the reservations and they sat down at a table that was fairly secluded from the rest of the bunch.

"So how was your day?" asked Kurenai, ready to continue talking with Kakashi right after being seated.

"It was stressful; I'm still trying to think who I'm going to train. That's the only thing that is on my mind, I cannot get it out of my head. It just sticks there, it is a difficult decision and there are pros and cons to both sides of the equation" said Kakashi as he was looking at the menu.

"I told you what I would do but you just need to do what is right for you, and that is all that matters." Said Kurenai. Deep down hoping that he would see things her way and train the Haruno girl instead of the "demon".

"So how is training with Shino going?" asked Kakashi, curious on how the other students were doing.

"Shino will not be training with me; he will be training with his father, Shibi instead. Shino said that my training is not needed at this point. I'm assuming he is going to work on his clan techniques, but clan techniques won't help you at the exams. A well rounded shinobi or kunoichi will win the exams; the most well rounded with one key strength will win the chunin exams." Said Kurenai, positive of that her way was right, from both past experience and watching the exams take place for countless years.

_'Naruto'_ thought Kakashi. Kakashi went back into deliberation on who to pick again, he could have the winner of the exams or create a better shinobi.

Kurenai and Kakashi went back to talking about other things and happenings around the village and what Kurenai was going to do with her new found free time. Kakashi and Kurenai finished up after an hour and a half of eating and started walking back to Kurenai's apartment, looking at the stars along the way. Kakashi had yet to be perverted, he knew that would have to wait until he got back to his apartment, as Kurenai would likely catch him and the date would be over that moment.

"It's so beautiful tonight" said Kurenai, gazing up at the stars in the sky.

"Yeah, I enjoy nights like these. The nights where you can see the stars in the sky, it almost reminds me of how many jutsu's I have in my aresnal." Kakashi said with a smirk on his face.

"That was lame Kakashi, nobody cares about ninjutsu, everybody knows that genjutsu is better, because you can easily trap your opponent in a genjutsu."

The argument began and ended at Kurenai's apartment. Kakashi stood at her door as she opened it using the key that she had in her shinobi gear. She opened the door and then stared back at Kakashi.

"I had a great time tonight Kakashi-kun"

"Same here Kurenai"

_'Wait when did the "kun" get added to the last part of my name. Does this mean I'm going to score tonight? This is major points for me if I do!!'_

Kurenai leaned forward into Kakashi and gave him a kiss on the lips. It lasted for a few seconds and there was no more action besides the soft gentle lips of Kurenai on Kakashi's lips. Kakashi knew that he didn't score but he was getting further into scoring a major goal.

"Good night Kakashi-kun, don't stand there all night in the cold" Kurenai said giggling, as she closed the door and looked at a stunned Kakashi, still shocked at what just happened.

_'Maybe I don't have to score after all, maybe it can come later'_ Kakashi thought as he finally headed back to the apartment which he lived in.

* * *

(10 PM, unknown location)

"Did you want to see me?" said a mysterious voice

"Yes, I need you to go to Konoha in thirty days, the faster you go there the better, just don't get caught while you are there" said another voice, the voice was more commanding and the voice had a hard edge to it, almost like the person didn't enjoy talking to others.

"I can do that, but why are you sending me?"

"The chunin exams are coming up and I need information on the next generation of shinobi, I just want you to get everybody's power level and make sure nobody is a threat" said the hard voice.

"Of course, I'm heading out in a few days"

"You're dismissed"

The shadow vanished quickly and the other shadow vanished quickly as well, leaving no trace they were there.

* * *

(6 AM, Hokage's office)

"So Kakashi, have you come to a decision yet?" asked Hiruzen who was laid back in his chair, his orange Icha Icha book was out in the open as he knew Kakashi was a big fan of the series.

"I have but I need you to invite somebody in here to hear this" Kakashi said.

"Alright, but before I summon this person, can you just tell me who you have picked to train" stated Hiruzen, the old man was awaiting an answer, an answer that took the whole 24 hour deadline.

Kakashi had come to a deicision early this morning. He knew that this was the right decision regardless of what people thought of it. Some would consider it ludicrious that he was wasting the abilities of a certain shinobi and having somebody else teach them while Kakashi could easily help this person. It was a long and tiring period before Kakashi had come to a decision and Kakashi barely got any sleep last night. He wished this type of predicament on nobody.

"I have chosen to train…."

* * *

A/N: Aww it's a cliffy!!! I'm sure many of you are mad about this ending but I needed to end it this way so it could build suspense on the next chapter. There is a lot of hidden stuff in this chapter hinting at the future of many characters, if you "can look beneath the underneath" then you can easily see where I'm heading with many of the characters and where they will be after the first timeskip. I'm sorry if the date scene sucked, I know some of you looked forward to it but I've never had a girlfriend before and I am clueless on what to do on a date, so can you guys please take it easy on me because I have no experience in that department of life.

Many unanswered questions here in this chapter...

Kyuubi and Naruto have actually connected, is Naruto going to become a demon?

Who are the two mystery people?

Who is Kakashi going to train?

If Kakashi trains Naruto, what is "that jutsu" and if Naruto doesn't train with Kakashi then will somebody else be able to teach it to him?

Is Kaka/Kure really going to work?

What is Naruto planning for Gaara?

The next chapter is going to be titled _**"A sudden move"**_

Read and Review, thanks guys for making this story go over 2 K in one day the last time, lets go for 3 K in one day this time. I appreciate all who read and then go the extra mile to review, thanks again guys.


	8. A Sudden Move

Chapter 8

A/N: Expect another chapter before the year ends. That is my timetable for this year. The final days leading up to the chunin exams and then the start of the chunin exams will be the first two chapters for next year.

This is where the story gets considerably darker. Lots of angst coming up in the next few chapters. I'm holding off on that character death promise for a while because I have changed plans for some characters.

**Kyubi, Inner Sakura and Unknown Character: Hi**

Regular Characters: Hi

_Thoughts: 'I am thinking of something'_

_----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------  
_

(6 AM, Hokage's office)

"So Kakashi, have you come to a decision yet?" asked Hiruzen who was laid back in his chair, his orange Icha Icha book was out in the open as he knew Kakashi was a big fan of the series.

"I have but I need you to invite somebody in here to hear this" Kakashi said.

"Alright, but before I summon this person, can you just tell me who you have picked to train" stated Hiruzen, the old man was awaiting an answer, an answer that took the whole 24 hour deadline.

Kakashi had come to a deicision early this morning. He knew that this was the right decision regardless of what people thought of it. Some would consider it ludicrous that he was wasting the abilities of a certain shinobi and having somebody else teach them while Kakashi could easily help this person. It was a long and tiring period before Kakashi had come to a decision and Kakashi barely got any sleep last night. He wished this type of predicament on nobody.

"I have chosen to train…."

"Kakashi just spill it already so we can get to training whoever you want" stated Hiruzen with a loud voice. If anything was known about the third Hokage, it was that he hated suspense and just liked knowing answers with no suspense attached.

"I have chosen to train Naruto" said Kakashi, negating the suspense and tension that was building in the atmosphere.

_'Alright, that means Sakura will have to train with somebody else, but who?'_ wondered Hiruzen.

"Sakura will be training with Kurenai" stated Kakashi

"Alright, we have all of our genin squared up with their senseis and training starts today. Good luck to both of your students Kakashi" Hiruzen said, anticipating a return to a certain orange book he kept in one of the desk drawers.

Kakashi shunshined out of the room to go find his student that he was training.

Hiruzen grumbled something about suspense and how it actually kills him and not just metaphorically. He then pulled out an orange book and started to read, his favorite pastime in the Hokage office when no business was needed to be attended to.

* * *

(Naruto's apartment)

Naruto was blissfully sleeping. Bliss was an understatement, Naruto was dreaming about being the Hokage and being in his office eating all the ramen he could. Naruto was currently downing ramen cup 56 when he was waked from his blissful slumber.

"Naruto are you in there?" said a muffled voice outside the door.

Naruto cautiously woke up and moved towards his shinobi equipment, grabbing a kunai before slowly opening the door. He opened the door and then quickly jumped in front of it to see who was there. He was greeted by a smiling figure with gravity-defying hair.

"Oh I see you are up now. I will be training you for the next thirty days" said Kakashi doing his "eye smile".

Naruto sighed a breath of relief, not wanting to have to attack a person this early in the morning. He was also glad it was Kakashi and not some drunken person looking to try to take down the "demon".

"I'm going to be at training ground number 7, I'll be waiting for you there to start our training for the chunin exam finals." Stated Kakashi before disappearing in a wind and leaf shunshin.

Naruto shut and locked the door before going to sit down on his bed again. He laid down with his hands behind his neck.

_'So Kyuubi, it's finally time to start training for the chunin exams'_

**'Yes it is kit, I think you are strong but there are other strong competitors out there for you to face.'** Said Kyuubi. Knowing in all of its wisdom that Naruto likely would have gotten cocky if he wasn't reminded who he was facing. Naruto knew that Gaara was likely going to be a tough opponent, Shikamaru could outsmart him and Neji had the byakugan but that was about it.

"Kyuubi, is there anything that I could get help from you with before the exams start?" asked Naruto.

Naruto knew that he could use all the advantages he could get would be great. He knew that there were some tough opponents in the final stage but then there were some people like Sakura who just didn't belong there. Naruto knew that his match with Sakura would likely take less than two minutes to finish.

**"Yes there is something but I would rather you start your training without knowing about it. If I told you this soon then it would be a hindrance to your training. Once you are able to get to a point where I can trust you with it then I will teach it to you"**

"Cool Kyuubi, I thought that you wouldn't be able to teach me anything" Naruto said with joy.

The great Kyuubi was very offended at this comment; it did not like being called weak or less than a shinobi because it wasn't able to offer anymore help.

**"Listen kit, I'm the great Kyuubi, I know techniques that you couldn't help to try to learn and would fail at learning in your lifetime. I am the greatest of the tailed beasts and could crush you in an instant"**

Naruto was beginning to get worried. The last thing he wanted was to have Kyuubi angry at him. In that case that meant that Naruto couldn't use any chakra or any of the Kyuubi's powers. That was an absolute recipe for disaster with tough opponents coming up in the exams.

**"I see you are beginning to get worried kit, remember that I am the most powerful bijuu and all others kneel before me. You are lucky to have me as a container instead of Shukaku. In my case, you just have to put up with the villagers nagging you every once in a while instead of not being able to sleep."**

"The villagers nagging me, yea I learned to put up with that. Originally I thought it was totally a bad thing but it actually combined with my shinobi training to a good effect. The scars still linger from that, not just psychically but mentally. That is the burden that I carry now Kyuubi, you on the other hand are no longer a burden."

While Kyuubi was able to heal most of Naruto's scars, Kyuubi was not as effective as it is now compared to Naruto's younger days. The more the seal aged, the more chakra Naruto was able to absorb, meaning when Naruto was young he had nobody to defend him and heal his scars. The most of the scars lingered all throughout Naruto's back and then there was one large gash on his chest where a sword sliced him open.

"Well I've got to go get ready now. If Kakashi-sensei is actually on time for something then I think I should at least get there soon. No need to keep him waiting with his history of being late for everything." Stated Naruto out loud to Kyuubi.

Naruto got his shinobi gear together as well as his attire and headed out his apartment door. He decided to walk to the training ground instead of quickly go through the secluded area where he could use his shinobi abilities to get there at a faster rate.

Naruto was examining each person that looked at him as he walked by. They all wondered what the "demon" was doing out since he usually avoided the civilian streets. Some shinobi still used the civilian streets but those were mostly kunoichi like Ino and Sakura.

The people of the village even noticed the change in Naruto. They knew about the last guy who talked about him, even in a low whisper.

***Flashback***

"Hey look it is the Demon kid" said one villager

Naruto walked right by and was pretending to hear nothing but he was on edge about it. If somebody else said something he would snap.

"I heard he is some pathetic wannabe shinobi, remember that demons never triumph" whispered another villager to the first villager.

Naruto quickly moved over to the villager and slammed his fist into his gut. The villager cried out helplessly in pain but was unable to do anything else. The other villager had eyes wide as saucers and was just in awe and fright of how fast Uzumaki had punched out his friend. Then Naruto took the other villager and threw him into a garbage can, the villager landed on the garbage can, hurting his back.

"Look, the villager lands in the trash, I hope you have fun with the other objects of the world that are just like you" sneered Naruto as he walked away. Luckly for Naruto there were no other villagers around that section of Konoha at night and nobody saw who it was.

***End Flashback***

Rumor had it the next day that Naruto was the one responsible for the injuries of the two villagers. The two villagers were so embarrassed by the accident that they didn't want to tell them that the "demon" with supposedly "weak shinobi skills" had easy dismantled them.

Naruto was amused at the frightened looks on the faces of all the women and men that had previous put him down in order to quell their thirst of hate for the Kyuubi. He didn't however like how the children cowered to him. They were so innocent and pure, like he once was. Naruto hated how the children were scared of him but he loved how the adults wouldn't mess with him it was truly a bittersweet feeling walking through the civilian area of the village hidden in the leaves. Suddenly Naruto stopped as walked by a large building.

The building is where the many genin teams from Suna had stayed. He saw from the Hokage monument the person he wanted to meet. On that roof during the night sat Sabaku no Gaara. Naruto had something in store for Gaara before the chunin exam finals started but he wanted to do it sooner than later so it would have time to fester within Gaara before they could fight.

Naruto smirked at that thought and was near the campground when something caught his attention. It was a voice, a very annoying one at that.

"Hey dead-last how is your training coming along. You learning anything? Or can you not learn it at all?" was the voice that Naruto heard, it was very high pitched and could make any man cover his ears in anguish.

Naruto spun around and saw a sight that he did not want to see before he began his training or even before the chunin exams started again. These thirty days marked an isolation period for him, where he could talk to the Kyuubi extensively and not have to worry about the other shinobi of Konoha or even missions. It would just be training and learning new techniques. While Naruto had trained extensively for the ten days he had off, Naruto still thought that he could be a lot better. Naruto was scanning his mind for possibilities of how he could avoid this conversation. Scratch conversation more like "tell you how sucky your life is". Naruto shot a blank so he sent a clone to go tell Kakashi where he was.

"Oh no, it is a clone, how scary. Are you going to fight me here? I'm sure you will not be able to beat me" said the brash platinum blond behind him.

"If you couldn't even lay a finger on Temari, then you would have no chance on even coming within 5 feet of me. Maybe close to a clone but you can have no chance of even getting offensive attacks in" said Naruto, hoping that Ino would finally shut up and move away from him.

"Naruto, we all know you took advantage of Hinata and her attraction to you to capitalize on an obvious flaw in her offense. It was nothing short of a fluke that you got her, anybody else and you would not be going onto the finals." Said Ino, sure of her answer. She knew she was a master of psychology and her father was even better so she knew how to read people's body language and tell their actions by that.

"Then why did everybody back away from me after I arrived back on the rafters. Everybody was scared of me, you know its not good to deny something too much, it distorts reality and that is what gets you killed. Maybe you can see it when I do that to one of your friends." Stated Naruto darkly. He was really starting to get angry.

"You wouldn't dare!" yelled Ino.

"I have the perfect opportunity. I face Sakura in the first round of the final stage. The final stage is where you can fight to the death and kill people. From what I have read there has been a few people that have died in the final stage before." Stated Naruto, rolling his eyes back to the left side trying to count how many people died but then gave up on it.

"Sakura will be able to beat you Naruto. Just because you have become darker and more unstable doesn't mean that you are immune to pain and the pain that Sakura will inflict on you will be the worst you felt in your life." Boldly declared Ino.

Naruto was now beyond pissed, no genin in his class or even the class before had experienced the pain he had in his life. The only other contender was Sasuke and Naruto immediately brushed that off because of how the Uchihas were given. Naruto could be wrong on that but he was damned if a blond haired silver spoon fed girl was to tell him how pain operated or how bad it felt. Naruto quickly spun on heel and grabbed Ino by the collar of her shirt, thrusting her into the wall head first. It didn't knock Ino out but it didn't help the recovery of her injury in the same location after Temari's fan gust attack

"Now let me tell you a lesson in pain Ino. I have not been respected one day in my life by this village. The villagers all look down on me and make sure my days are miserable. I can't go into shops without getting beat up or charged extra. I have been secluded from society as a whole here. I don't know about other shinobis but many of them would have probably left the village by now but I have some speck of loyalty to this village. So don't you ever tell me what pain is but instead I will lecture you on pain instead." Said Naruto.

Ino's head was throbbing as her wound from the chunin exams starting flaring up. She hadn't bled from the wound but it hurt and she was seeing stars from being rammed into the wall with the back of her head.

"Pain is the thing that breeds hate from a person. So by me showing the world my pain and the pain I have suffered I can transfer it all onto you so you can feel the oppression of having pain suffocating you every day. Then your hatred can breed vengeance and you will come after me one day. That will be the day that I either end your existence or continue to make it miserable. I tend to want to make things miserable for you because you should know Ino. It's all psychological, breaking the soul is a lot harder than breaking the body, isn't it?" Naruto questioned darkly, a look of impassiveness on his face but with an underlying tone of malice.

Ino knew that Naruto was right. Breaking the soul was harder than the body. She was currently pinned and lots of emotions were running through her head as her body ached to be let go of. But Ino had a small look of confusion on her face and Naruto picked up on it and decided to give another anology.

"I can tell you did not fully understand, it's alright you never have had the brains to fully comprehend things. That's why you are such a pathetic fan girl."

Ino scowled at this comment, deep down she knew he was right but she was a tough person on the surface and wanted to let Naruto know that she did not appreciate that comment.

"Let me put it this way. In the animal world, there is a gardener who is a pig. This pig is the top gardener in its village and everybody respects and buys things from the gardener. Then there is the fox, the fox is the outcast of the village, he has no friends and only knows enemies. The fox only knows pain and suffering and therefore it is the only thing he can bestow on other people. So the fox decides to bestow pain and suffering on the pig, the fox destroys most of the garden and takes the most precious flower from it and destroys it. While the fox destroys the flower it leaves its own paw print to indicate it was the destroyer. The pig obviously realizes who did it and goes after the fox, the fox lays a huge beat down on the pig and does the same thing two days later. The cycle keeps going on and the fox is able to enjoy inflicting pain, the only thing that has happened to the fox its whole life. The cycle gives the fox retribution for what it had suffered for. Do you now get it?" questioned Naruto with a heavy tone of disgust for one of the leader of the "Sasuke fangirl club".

"So by inflicting pain to you, I can crush your miserable existence and make it worse. So that all can know the pain I have felt."

With that, Naruto dropped Ino back on the ground and walked to the training ground where he and Kakashi were supposed to meet 20 minutes ago. Ino was starting at Naruto while he left, the black flaps of his trench coat swinging in the breeze. It was a chaotic harmony of destruction and anguish that did not look like it was going to be stopped sometime in the future.

_'I have to tell Sakura about this, she better get some good training in before facing Naruto or she could end up with a terrible end to her life. I still think that he won't beat her, I have enough faith in Sakura, she just has to be careful.'_ thought Ino, denying what she knew was true deep within her.

She was mulling over the words about pain and hatred. She was going to have to warn Sakura that Naruto was deadly serious about this match, literally deadly serious.

* * *

(Training ground 7)

Kakashi was by the memorial stone, when Naruto's clone had arrived he was actually pleased because it gave him more time to reflect on the deaths of his friends and comrades in battle. Kakashi did this everyday in order to honor those he fought along side. After twenty minutes of waiting for Naruto after the clone had arrived, the real Naruto showed up ready for training.

"So Naruto, I see you finally arrived. Don't worry about excuses, things come up at the last minute and sometimes you can't arrive on time" Said Kakashi with a smile on his face.

"You of all people would know about that Kakashi-sensei" Naruto replied with a dark voice and a laugh.

"So now that you have arrived, we can begin training for the upcoming stage in the chunin exams. I want to start out in a different way from any other training session and I'm going to ask you what you thought of each opponent, strengths and weaknesses you picked up on of theirs and I will help you if you need any help." Stated Kakashi.

Kakashi was really curious of how Naruto perceived each of the other competitors. This would give him a little leeway into entering Naruto's mind and psyche. Part of the thirty days training was to get Naruto to lighten up a bit and take things a lot less seriously, as well as get rid of the brooding attitude.

"I will name a competitor and let's see what you come up with. I will start with somebody easy, Sakura."

"She shouldn't be here and although she hadn't fought in the preliminaries stage, whoever she would have fought would have won. She is a fangirl, especially of Sasuke and seems to have a rivalry with Ino Yamanaka, who she is also using to gather information from me and to possibly spy on me for the next match so she knows what I will be using." Stated Naruto, all from observations. There were times where Kyuubi's heightened sense of sight and smell as well as Kyuubi's amazing awareness pays off and Naruto had become a fairly good information gatherer from just the enemy location and enemy movement, his scouting skills still needed to improve though.

_'This could be a problem; maybe I should notify the Hokage of the Yamanaka girl possibly spying on our training sessions, I'm not very happy with Sakura about this.'_ Kakashi was snapped out of his thoughts when Naruto continued speaking.

"I have taken care of the situation already"

Kakashi was surprised by that, he considered the time period in which Naruto would have to take care of a problem like that. He wasn't surprised though, even if Naruto became darker he was still the most unpredictable shinobi in the village.

"I ran into the Yamanaka girl and that is why I was late here. She thought she could take me on and taunt me but instead I turned the tables and made her scurry with her tail between her legs." Stated Naruto, trying to remember what exactly happened, he was a little under the influence of the Kyuubi then.

_'Remind me why I'm telling Kakashi all about this'_

**'Kit, you got to learn to put trust into the other shinobi of the village and don't worry about Kakashi telling other people. He won't do that. Instead, he will keep all the information to himself and try to analyze you using it.'**

_'This better pay off though Kyuubi'_

_'Interesting, it seems like Naruto had to use no physical force since his fists haven't been used and he doesn't look like he has had any time of physical activity for the day. I will monitor the situation and keep a close eye on this. Nobody has to know about this yet.'_ Kakashi thought to himself, playing right into what the Kyuubi thought he would do.

"Anyway, we are going on down the list. The next up is Neji Hyuga."

"Neji is very skilled at taijutsu and looks to be using his clan technique. From some of the reading I have done in the past and what Hinata showed during the academy, his taijutsu is centered on knocking out one's chakra pathways and creating a disturbance within the pathways. This could be used very effectively and could cause techniques to back fire on a user due to the imbalance of chakra at the pathways."

"Good, Neji can also see your pathways with the Byakugan and can use it to strike different chakra pathways. Be warned though, Neji is extremely skilled with that taijutsu set and can hit pathways if you leave them open for him to hit. Having the Byakugan also means that he can see your chakra, I'll let you come up with the different techniques that will not work on a Byakugan user." Stated Kakashi, wondering if Naruto would realize that the Shadow Clones wouldn't work on Neji unless he balanced the chakra evenly among them.

"Anyway, the next is Temari"

"Temari uses her battle fan to channel wind chakra into the fan and uses it to whip it at the opponent in the form of a gust wind. There is nothing special about anything else, probably easier to attack her close range with taijutsu. I'm curious to see if she can actually use the fan as a weapon."

"You pretty much drilled that right on the head, next up is Shino"

"Shino uses his clan technique to harvest insects within his body or clothing and can manipulate them to attack his opponent. The ones he used against Sasuke were chakra absorbing insects and that caused Sasuke's jutsu to backfire against him. Shino's taijutsu is his worst attribute as he was down near the bottom of the list during the taijutsu spars."

"Another good observation, Shino's bugs are actually harvested inside of his body, the bugs are somehow able to live in his body. Remember though, I can't tell you everything since I can't copy clan techniques or describe its intricacies with the sharingan, another reason why Sasuke lost. Anyway let me hear what you have on Shikamaru" said Kakashi

"Shikamaru uses shadows and is the smartest one out of us all. However I can beat him using my speed and agility, it doesn't appear as Shikamaru has large chakra coils because he prefers to finish fights quickly and sometimes even forfeits." Said Naruto.

Kakashi was pleased with this analysis over any of the other one's because Naruto had successfully exploited a weakness in an opponent, something a shinobi has to do in every battle.

"Alright, I heard what I needed to hear. You just accomplished the whole goal of the exercise here. This was a two part exercise." Said Kakashi, looking down at Naruto who had a confused look on his face.

"Part one was to analyze how good you were with correlating data to opponents and how much information you can attain off one battle of theirs. In the shinobi world, sometimes you have only heard of one fight with a shinobi in it before you are sent on a mission to capture them. You have to look underneath the underneath which was the second part of this exercise. By acknowledging that Shikamaru prefers to finish fights could be for his lazy nature but even Shikamaru likes to be competitive, all guys do. The Nara family is known for not having a high amount of chakra in their coils meaning they don't have as much stamina as you or I do but they do have superior intelligence over us."

Naruto now understood what Kakashi was looking for and was grateful that he was able to explain a weakness before he got to people he could not fully analyze yet (Gaara) and those whose fights he slept through (Lee and Kankarou).

"Now we can actually begin on training since I know you are prepared with the right intelligence for a one on one battle."

_'I'm glad this day is going so well, especially after what happened this morning.'_

***Flashback***

Kakashi arrived at Kurenai's apartment and knocked on the door. It was early in the morning but most shinobi were up at this time, spare the genins that still liked to sleep in and have their "beauty sleep" but Kakashi knew Kurenai was not one of those types of people. Kurenai arrived at the door with a smile on her face when she noticed it was Kakashi at the door.

"What can I do for you Kakashi-kun?" putting the emphasis on the kun suffix to tease Kakashi.

With that train of thought Kakashi was thinking of all the scenarios and the different things he could do with Kurenai but they were all perverted but he did have enough time to do them before he had to arrive at the Hokage tower with his decision.

"I was wondering if you could do a big favor for me…" Kakashi said but then trailed off, nervous about what he was going to ask.

"How big of a favor is it Kakashi-kun?" replied Kurenai with a sweet and innocent look on her face, it was almost as if she knew she was teasing Kakashi and getting into his perverted thoughts.

"Um, I had to make a decision between training Sakura and Naruto and I finally came to a decision" said Kakashi, still very nervous of what might happen.

"So you chose the right decision Kakashi-kun. I'm sure you made the right decision, you and I both know what that was." Said Kurenai sweetly, trying to pull Kakashi's strings as if he were a puppet.

"I did, I am going to train Naruto and I need a favor from you" said Kakashi, preparing for an explosion of outrage.

"Why are you training that brat!!??" questioned Kurenai loudly, she usually didn't get upset. She wasn't "The Ice Queen of Konoha" for nothing, she was just beyond pissed that Kakashi chose the person who destroyed her favorite student and embarrassed her.

"I chose him because I was once like him and he needs my help with his attitude and uncaring nature for others." Stated Kakashi, knowing that at one time he was like that but Kurenai wouldn't know that side of him since she was fairly new to the village.

"Ok, besides what do you want from me?" Kurenai asked, agitated about Kakashi's choice but it did provide some reasoning behind it. She learned about Kakashi's past on the date and he was once bitter and cold like Naruto but that only changed after Obito died and Kakashi was more like Obito after that.

"I want you to train Sakura" Kakashi asked simply, hoping it was a yes.

"Kakashi-kun, you know I have stuff do with Anko during this time period." Whined Kurenai, unhappy about the request.

"Is there anything I can do for you to change your mind?" asked Kakashi.

Kurenai stood there for a few minutes pondering what Kakashi could do for her that could make her happy enough to train Sakura. Kurenai was running through the usual stuff shopping, pampering her but that wasn't enough. Something that a typical girl would ask for wouldn't do in this situation, and besides Kurenai was tougher than a typical girl and didn't necessarily like the same things. Kurenai gave kunoichi everywhere a good name. She suddenly came up with an idea. Kakashi noticed this and his mind came out of the gutter where he had been imagining the things that he wished Kurenai would ask for.

"I will do the training on one condition and that one condition only" stated Kurenai

_'Maybe it will come true, my hopes and all my dreams could come true. My perverted senses are tingling but I have to keep them to a minimum. If Kurenai catches me with that look on my face, she will not hesitate to smack me half way across Konoha.'_

Kakashi was trying hard not to get that stupid look of perverseness on his face when Kurenai spoke up and he paid attention again.

"I will do the training with Sakura if we switch on the last day of training, meaning you take Sakura and I take Naruto for the last day." Stated Kurenai, her ideas were already formed in her head and she just needed to take action and hope Kakashi would say yes.

"That's good with me. I have to go to the Hokage tower now. Bye Kurenai-chan" Kakashi said simply and shunshined out in leaves and wind.

Kurenai had an evil smirk on her face as she closed the door and began planning for both Sakura's training and what she had in store for Naruto before the exams started.

***End Flashback***

"Naruto, the first thing I want to work with you on before we start preparing for individual opponents is your shadow clones. I have something in mind for you with the clones." Kakashi stated, he was running through his memory of how Naruto used his shadow clones.

Naruto then summoned one hundred clones and was ready for Kakashi to start teaching them something.

"Naruto, please reduce the number of clones you summon, you don't want to miss days because you summoned too many clones and have an information overload. That is a good way to get your self killed" stated Kakashi aggravated at Naruto's antics. Kakashi knew that Naruto was smart but he still showed signs of the old knuckleheaded shinobi that some people enjoyed being around. You just had to look hard to find instances where you could point and see where he was that same shinobi.

Naruto then reduced the number of shadow clones to about 25, he held his head as the clones started popping back into another dimension as Naruto received different information, such as things about the landscape that could be noticed in about a minute's time.

"You still need to reduce the shadow clones down, go to about six or seven of them and that should be fine" stated Kakashi.

Naruto did the same thing except there was less pain but more pointless information about the environment flowing to his brain.

"Well I guess nine clones will be sufficient to the training" Kakashi then stopped when he heard a noise.

Kakashi looked over at one of the clones who was grabbing his stomach and laughed a lilttle when Kakashi looked at him. He then looked over at his master.

"Master can we go get some ramen. I'mmmmmmmmmm sooooooooooooo hungry!!" said the clone. The clone was in close proximity to Naruto and within arms reach.

Naruto drew his leg back and swiftly kicked the clone sending back to whatever universe it came from. Kakashi chuckled at his antics before speaking again.

"So I guess eight clones will be good enough for this exercise." Said Kakashi.

Naruto was curious on what exercise Kakashi had planned for him and was somewhat eager to begin on it.

"I want you to work with your shadow clones in a taijutsu only spar against me. I want killing intent from you. Remember the last time we sparred. You didn't even land a single hit on me. Now do your best and don't hold back."

Naruto scowled when Kakashi said he didn't even land a blow on him. Naruto was about to prove that theory wrong.

"Remember to work with your clones not have them suicide into me. I want you to try to land a series of attacks without any of them disappearing. When two of them go away, just summon two more back. Is that understood?"

"Yes, Kakashi-sensei I understand the directions." Said Naruto, ready to pounce on Kakashi. He had to be careful with his clones and set an opening for them so they don't get attacked.

"Alright then lets begin" Kakashi said as Naruto sped toward him.

* * *

(Training ground 36)

Sakura was walking to the training ground waiting for her sensei to arrive there. She learned that Kakashi was going to train Naruto and she felt betrayed in some ways and then Inner Sakura piped up with her thought.

**'He is probably trying to get Naruto to actually beat somebody who is going to fight back or train those high level ninjutsu moves because he can't handle them. Shannaro!!'**

Sakura had to agree, besides Hinata's fight she hadn't seen Naruto fight since the Land of Waves match against Haku and he hadn't been able to kill Haku there so what should she have to worry about. Hinata was just caught off-guard, that's all.

Sakura noticed a faint presence lingering nearby but it was too late when she spun around and saw it was her new sensei there with a kunai in hand.

"Your awareness is not as sharp as I thought it was." Said her new sensei.

Sakura was shocked at the least to see her new sensei was Kurenai Yuhi. That was Hinata's sensei and she looked like she knew exactly how to dissect an opponent with those red eyes of hers.

"Come with me, I want to show you something before you start training with me" said Kurenai, beckoning Sakura to come with her back to town.

* * *

(Training ground 7, 3 hours later)

Naruto and Kakashi were having a good spar and Naruto was actually landing hits on Kakashi with the clones. Kakashi had successfully exploited some weaknesses in the clones' taijutsu movements and had eliminated them and then Naruto would have to produce another, weakening his chakra. Kakashi had Naruto down to four clones when he finally told Naruto it was time to stop.

"I see that you have improved on your taijutsu skills with your clones. I want you to practice using your clones more efficiently though, with that being said you already have a pretty good efficiency of using your clones."

Naruto was soaking in all the information. The last thing he wanted to do was forget something his sensei was teaching, after all Kakashi was a great shinobi of Konoha.

"Your taijutsu set up with Hinata was impressive but you used the clones individually and that could have been a weakness but you were against an opponent who was weaker than you and you easily set her up for your taijutsu combo set. The last blow was a combination attack and I do have to give credit for you inventing that little maneuver as it was quite effective."

Naruto had an evil smile on his face after remembering the effects of that maneuver. Word had spread around town that Hinata had busted up at least half of her face, and broken her nose. She still had not woken up. It gave Naruto pride that he could put that kind of beat down on somebody of his own age group.

"However, I challenge you to use your clones for combination attacks. While you do not have a clan style of taijutsu as most of the other kids of your class, you do have an advantage of all of them that can easily go above and beyond that advantage and that is the shadow clones. Using the shadow clones, you can create attacks that only two people would be able to create and unique attack points that no shinobi at your age would see coming. It would also open up attack windows that you have not had before. It's just an advantage you need to take care of. Most people underestimate the style of taijutsu the academy teaches and everybody tries to learn their own but if you are able to use the academy style of taijutsu and a read and react taijutsu with shadow clones against an opponent, you could beat them on taijutsu alone without using any ninjutsu what so ever, and it also saves your chakra for fights against later opponents." Kakashi lectured, trying to get his knowledge into Naruto's head. He knew it was likely going in it as Naruto was becoming quite the prodigy of his class and it was time to teach him a move that all prodigies knew but that could come tomorrow.

"You are dismissed Naruto, we had a good training session today and we should work on the same thing tomorrow, just think your battle through using observations about your opponents and execute on their weak points. That within itself is more lethal than most ninjutsu or genjutsu." Kakashi finished and vanished into air with swirling leaves and wind. Naruto began walking to Ichiraku's seeing as they were done for the day.

* * *

(Konoha Hospital, room 233)

Kurenai and Sakura walked into a room where Hinata was. Instead of the last time where Hinata was unconscious, she was conscious now and talking to those who actually cared about her. Hinata gave a small smile when Kurenai was in the room and then lowered it when she saw Sakura. Hinata really wasn't comfortable with talking to anybody about what happened yet and was embarrassed of how things turned out, especially the aftermath of the match.

"Hi Hinata, it seems like you have woken up. This is very good for your recovery" said Kurenai with a small smile on her face. Kurenai was glad that her favorite student was awake and conscious but she hadn't been able to move much yet, her face was atrocious looking after the beating she endured. She might have a scar on her face for a while after her fall from Naruto's taijutsu combo.

Sakura then walked up to Hinata and gave her a small hug, as much of a hug that she could have given. This surprised Hinata, she was sure that Sakura might be smug about somebody from her team demolishing her. Hinata was happy that Sakura visited her with Kurenai-sensei.

"K-K-Kurenai-sensei, who are the finalists and who does Neji-kun have to face in the first round?" Hinata said shyly playing with her fingers as she said the statement.

"Neji has to face Gaara in the first round. Neji is a strong individual and he will be able to beat Gaara" said Kurenai with confidence. Although she knew Neji had a strong chance of losing the match, she wanted to heal Hinata's confidence some before she left the hospital. She knew that Hinata's confidence was fragile before the chunin exams but now it was more delicate than ever.

Hinata then looked up at Sakura but still was playing with her fingers before she talked.

"S-S-Sakura-c-chan who d-d-do you have to f-f-face in the first round?" Hinata stuttered, Hinata's stutter appeared to have gotten worse in the hospital. Kurenai had come by earlier and received news that Hinata had woken up but due to the psychological impact of the fight she might not be the same again, she might become dissocial and unconfident in all of her abilities as well as her stuttering possibly getting worse.

Sakura looked at Kurenai with a worried expression on her face and Kurenai motioned that she could tell Hinata.

"Hinata-chan I have to face Naruto in the first round of the finals" Sakura said with a low voice, hoping Hinata won't faint or go back into unconsciousness. Much to her surprise she did not but Sakura saw that Hinata visibly winced at Naruto's name being mentioned. Hinata still had both visible and invisible scars from her fight.

"Hinata-chan, I know it is hard to have somebody you like do that to you but if it makes you feel better, Sasuke does that to me and Ino all the time. He ignores us and makes sure that we get the message that he doesn't really care about us. The only reason he will defend me is so the team will get better and he won't be dragged down by me. He probably likes our psychopath teammate better than me." Sakura said, she had some tears rolling down her cheeks as she said that.

Sakura really did care for Sasuke, at first it had been fangirl affection but ever since they had become teammates, Sakura became more loving to the person Sasuke actually was instead of the person the fanclub hyped him up to be. Sakura was hoping this would cheer Hinata up. Hinata was still sad about the whole thing but was happy to see somebody was like her in the world, and was happy that the two other kunoichi from her class were in the same dilemma as her.

Sakura, Kurenai and Hinata all chatted for a while before the nurses came in and had to run tests on Hinata. Kurenai promised she would be back later and took herself and Sakura back to the training ground using a shunshin.

"That is why I am training you, so you don't end up like her trapped in a hospital with very few people caring about you. I hope you use that as motivation for your training with me in the future. Training is going to be rigorous and you are going to be able to beat the demon" Kurenai finished and then surprised Sakura.

"That is all for today, think about what I have said and come back with that as your motivation." Kurenai disappeared into a shunshin of leaves and water leaving Sakura all by herself letting the information fester at her.

**'We will not be like Hinata, we will avenge her and take down the demon, Shannaro!!'** yelled Inner Sakura, giving the real Sakura the motivation she needed to get serious about her training.

* * *

(At the same time, ??? country)

A man was traveling through the forest at a slow rate. He was still a long way away from Konoha, his intended destination. The person heard two other shinobi moving in the same direction, he quickly hid using a jutsu. The shinobi were from the Hidden Sound village.

"So we are here to scout the shinobi" said the kunoichi.

"Remember we are after the Uchiha as well. We have to scout him even if he did lose in the preliminaries. Somebody has to engage him to get a reading on him." Said the other sound shinobi.

The sound shinobi quickly walked by and then the man dropped the jutsu to reveal himself back into the world.

"Looks like we aren't the only ones heading to Konoha to scout."

**"Tell me something that isn't obvious idiot"**

End of Chapter

* * *

A/N: So Naruto is on the path of darkness and Sakura is motivated to take him down for Hinata and herself. Kurenai has also implanted the seeds that Naruto is a demon in Sakura's head and may lead to more conflict between the team 7 teammates. I think everybody now sees who Naruto is becoming a parallel to (though there are some differences between these two) but there are still many unanswered questions and all will be revealed soon in my fanfic.

As always, please review and give me some feedback. Spot any errors or differences then feel free to tell me but some of the jutsus (like shadow clone) has changed a little bit (for instance in the anime the clones all have the same chakra, in this fanfic you have to balance the chakra in order to keep it similar).

Next chapter will be called Confrontation (I think everybody knows what is going to happen next chapter now).


	9. Author's Note

**This is an Author's Note alert. I have bad news and good news.**

Bad News:

I'm going to abandon the story. I'm not satisfied where this is going and I'm going to just completely scrap the story.

Good News:

I'm going to start the story over again with a different title and where I get to create Naruto's past, childhood etc. The story will be called _'Deception' _and the first chapter will be out in a few days. The story will have some elements changed about it but will be going along the same lines. The chapters should be longer as well (10,000 words+ for all chapters)

I'm sad to have to abandon the story because I felt that where it was going was unsatisfactory and I feel bad for those who wanted to read and wanted me to continue on with the stories but some things have to come to an end. So anybody who was reading this story should definately read Deception, it's going to contain a lot more angst and violence than this story.

So look out for _Deception_, which should be popping up soon.


End file.
